What? Purple Painted Aquacultured LR

[SteveJor]

I have never heard of such a thing until I visited a LFS and saw "aquacultered live rock" for sale for $10.99 a pound. It was coated with some type of purple paint material to make it look like corraline. The guy said it starts as base rock that gets the coating and then they cure it in the tanks.
What kind of stuff is this? The coating covered all of the natural holes in the rock and the purple color didn't even look natural. Not to mention this stuff was dense and heavy so a small piece would end up running $50.
Is this stuff for real? Have I been out of the reef hobby this long that I don't know about this new type of reef rock?
I've seen fake plastic reef rocks that looked more natural than this stuff.

[J.B.]

Sounds like they're "sucker" hunting...what a bunch of unscrupulous turds!

[Freshwater Tropic]

I'm gonna vote it's an acrylic based paint used to coat the rock. It's thick enough to look like coraline algae. Not sure though, Either way... that stuff isn't right. It looks terrible. eliminates the beneficial elements of the LR but covering any holes or pockets. I would never recommend it unless someone has a FOWLR tank. Even than, I think the stuff looks ridiculous.

[Crazygar]

Sounds like a sham to me. Covering the rock with paint, takes away the whole purpose of having it in the first place. Walk away from it!

Gary

[Saban2013]

Is that a government run venture?