Slone Mercer, 26, owns and operates Exotic Aquatics, 608 N Porter (Web site: www.exoticaquaticsonline.com), which sells coral, saltwater fish and other supplies. He talked with reporter Chris Schutz about his shop and the hobby of keeping marine aquariums.
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Why did you decide to start the shop?
It was a hobby for a couple of years. I have a friend who worked at a shop in Oklahoma City, and I got into the business aspect of it. I got hooked up with a guy in California, working on his Web site, and then I started selling stuff out of my house for him. It kind of evolved into doing it for me.
Your shop sells coral. Isn't that difficult to keep?
Ten to 15 years ago, there wasn't quite the technology and the products there are out now that make coral-keeping a lot easier. In the past 10 years or so, people have been keeping coral successfully, being able to keep them to hold their color and to live and actually grow in their aquariums rather than kind of slowly dying off.
Why do people buy coral?
Some people purchase them as plants because they look like plants, but they're actually living invertebrates. They will buy them for decoration just like you would buy a fish. A reef tank is a big deal in marine aquariums, which means you have the coral, your living coral in there along with your fish.
Is coral just a backdrop for fish in an aquarium?
There's a lot of people who just have a coral-only aquarium. It's still full of animals, but they're just different kinds. You can watch it grow and feed it. Some of the stuff, you can actually watch it eat.
Aren't some types of coral endangered?
I'm trying to start kind of an aquaculture facility, growing out the coral rather than taking from the ocean every time you want a coral. A lot of people are getting more into the aquaculture of coral that has already been through two or three generations in a captive tank rather than taken out of the ocean. Sometimes they seem to fare better that way.
Maybe some of us that are into coral propagation might have some of the corals that are extinct in 20 or 30 years. That's one reason I'd like to get into it, is maybe try to keep the (coral) reef alive as much as we can, maybe even one day add back.
Do you worry about what will happen to an exotic fish or coral after you sell it?
A lot of times you kind of wonder, does this person really need this fish? I try to educate them as much as I can. I'll answer any question they've got. You hope somebody that's going to spend $100 on a fish isn't just going to go kill it.
What is the large fish in the front of the store?
He's a very large clown trigger. I bought him at a wholesale in Oklahoma City. They had him in about a 40-gallon tank. He's at least a good 12 to 13 inches long, so that's not really the size of tank he should have been in. His nickname is Jaws. He's got some big teeth and he's very aggressive. When I first got him, anytime anybody would walk by the tank, he would just attack the glass. He has kind of a softer side; he likes to be petted at times. He thinks you're kind of grooming him.
