a break from the monotony...an easy question

S

sublime-1

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Ok,

I bought 13lbs (in 1 lg. and 2 small pieces) of Live Rock from Neptune's 2 weeks ago.

Bill had just gotten a shipment of Live Rock and I happened to be standing there when he cracked open the box.

Well, of course my wallet got the better of me and I bought just over 13 lbs. I have 2 small pieces and a larger piece with some stony frags on it, and all sorts of interesting colors and sponges etc.

I have a 90G, with a 20g sump, very stable temp, and params. I do not dose anything currently. The only thing in besides Live Rock are a frag of Star Polyps, a Feather Duster, two large serpent stars and 2 Yellow Tail Dams. Of course, there's a cleanup crew as well, about a dozen Red Legged Hermits, 3 large turbos, and a sally lightfoot crab.


Anyway, I dumped the rock in a bucket, added some freshly made S/W and I have been running a skimmer and a powerhead in the rubbermaid for the two weeks.


I have changed the entire volume of water once, and scrubbed off as much of the black gunk as possible from the cracks and crevices.


Now, traditional methods for fully curing L.R. would dictate that you wait until Ammonia and Nitrite reach "0" before adding this rock to your tank.

However, with a fully cycled display with no bioload, can I add the rock into my existing tank with little chance for ill effects ? Shouldn't the existing 80 - 90lbs of L.R. act as a buffer to the load placed by the nearly fully cured LR ?


I am reading very little nitrate in my display, probably 5-8ppm.


Or, should I continue to let the live rock die off, and wait until it reaches some sort of stasis as far as the cycling / curing goes ?


Any advice is helpful.

Thanks.

BTW: The rock is freaking bad-a$$.
 
i would think you will see your levels would go up as even though you cleaned it of you still have dead stuff unseen in crevices and holes. so mini cycle might happen in my opinion...but i would put it in as you do not have a high bioload
 
Hi,

I would go ahead and put it in and monitor parameters. The worst I would expect is a mini-cycle but as mentioned, your current LR would most likely mitigate this.

Cheers!
 
Does Bill buy his rock fully cured?
Have you tested the water that your
LR is in? I would say if its not too far
off in the Nitrate area from your display
toss it in. Thats just my opinion, I may
be wrong... :wink:
 
I wouldn't be as concerned about a mini cycle as I would just the usual hitchhikers and/or sea cooties that might be on it. If you haven't exposed a lot of sponge tissue I say its probably safe to put into the display after a brief QT just for observation. I've heard a lot of good things about this rock. What's it going for, anyway?

Any pics?
 
If it doesn't stink - I'd put it in, maybe check amonia in a couple days but I doubt you will see a spike. There would have been some die off from the original shipping but you probably are past that now.
 
Well,

It's from Tonga but it's not branch. It has a really neat greenish, brown and yellow hue to it. with lots of pink.


I know it's pre-cured, and all of Bill's stuff is of the absolute freshest and highest quality.


I scraped off what was left of the transit die off, but it was just black sludge that looked like seaweed. Not really any dying sponges, or critters, just some little mini cockroach looking bugs and a few snail and crab shells.



I sprayed the rock underwater with a powerhead to blow out the crevices, and then toothbrushed all the black sludge off and did a 100% water change.

I have not adjusted the temp since I don't have a spare heater, but the tank tests at about 78 degrees with the ambient temp of my upstairs.


I did test my main display and the rock bucket at the same time.

Display

Amm - 0
Nitri - 0
Nitrate - 5-8ppm
SG - 1.025
Temp - 80
DK - 10
CA - 420


Rock Bucket (24 hrs. post water change.)

Amm - 1.5 mg/l <---pretty high
Nitrite - 1.0 mg/l
Nitrate - 5 (or a little less, tells me the natural biological filtration is not kicking in on this new rock.)
SG - 1.023


So, after having said all this, everyone still in consensus that it's cool to add to my display.

The reason I bought it is that I have some base rock and lace rock that is growing coraline but isn't of course "live-rock". I had planned to supplement over time and get the lace rock swapped out with live.

My next batch is going to be tonga branch ordered thru Bill, once this gets added and everything stabilizes. I know it would have been better to get it all at once and avoid the stress of constantly changing things, but I #1 don't want to bloe $500 all at once on rock, and #2 wanted to get some reps under me cleaning and curing rock, rearranging my tank, and etc.

Thanks for all present and future advice on the topic.
 
might want to look at marcorocks.com lot cheaper than buying live rock. only down side it is not live but really goos stuff
 
with the amonia high, I'd hold off, wait for it to cycle, or do another water change on the bucket and check again tommorow. You want to get past the die off and amonia generation. Granted, from a volumn perspective it's not much but not worth stressing out your main
 
Okay,

I have about 10G of salt ready to be used for a water change. My display is in good shape and probably doesn't need it at the moment, so perhaps I will just do a partial water change on my rock bucket and watch the params over the weekend.
 
or use your old tank water from the water change to replace the water in the bucket

the tank water would suffice for what you need on the rocks for now
 
lol,


you read my mind, i was thinking to myself "Self, why waste the new water on curing rock, as the old water is mostly contaminant free.


DOH
 
Agreed. Hold off until the AMM comes down. Looks like it is going to spike soon or possibly already has and is on its way down. Check it again in a few days and it will give a better idea of how to proceed.

Definitely use the old water from your tank for the LR change out. If nothing else you will be moving bacteria and free swimming organisms from the good tank to the cycling bucket. Could help with the process.
 
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