Base Rock

[evetan83]

How do you guys feel about base rock? I'm setting up a 100 gallon tank with corals, and am tempted to use a ratio of base rock and live rock to save some money. Do any of you use/recommend/not recommend base rock, and if so, in what ratio to live rock? I read base rock doesn't grow coraline...or at least very very slowly.

Thanks!

 

[tradosz]

Go for it. We used base rock for our 215 and it worked GREAT. Ratio was about 30 to 35% base and the rest live. Your coraline growth may somewhat depend on the type of base rock. Ours was from an old sea bed quarried outside of Miami. That online Vendor appears to have closed shop. Stone was light and very pourous with large surface areas due to holes, crevices, etc... and the coraline formed very quickly.

Good luck.

 

[waterbeing]

evetan83,

I believe several members have gotten good 'holey' base rock from the vendor listed on our 'Find Your Local Fish Store' page near the bottom.
Whiz Q Stone
4501 East Loop 820 South
Fort Worth, TX 76119
817-429-0822

The more caves/holes that you can find in it would be good for critters and bacteria beds eventually. While it won't have the diversity of life (both good *and* bad :? ) that new live rock will have, it will certainly cover over eventually and look very much like normal. After all, even PVC supports the coralline growth. I even use some old lava rock that I've had for 30ish years from my first foray into salt water tanks in one of my current tanks. Good luck finding some good looking pieces.
Doug

 

[DalaiTom]

@tradosz wrote:

If you're talking about Reeferrocks, they're back!

In any case, that's where I'd recommend getting your base rock.

 

[evetan83]

So only holy rock with lots of crevices. No solid rocks then?

 

[tradosz]

Check out the site DalaiTom posted. This is the sea bed rock quarried in Florida we used. Check the pictures of base rock and compare it to the pictures of holey rock. I am prejudiced, but there is no comparison. The holey rock is much denser and does not have near the surface area of referrocks' base rock. If they are doing business as they were when we ordered, they will take a picture of your order, if you rerquest one, and you will see what you are ordering. We did, and the original picture had smaller rock then what we wanted, so they picked some bigger rock for us. The final order was approximately 25% more then then the weight we ordered, and at no additional charge. Can't say enough good things about this base rock.

 

[Bayou]

I used Reeferrock to stock my 190 and I love it!
The cost was good, I had no bad hitchhikers coming into my tank and if your tank is healthy it will only tank 3 or 4 months to get good coraline coverage. Especially if you seed the tank with a few clean pieces.
The guy down there is really nice. If you call him and tell him how you want to aquascape your tank he will find rocks to do it. He will even take a pic of the stones and email it to you.
I would definatly use them again in the future.