Anyone start with mostly base rock, little LR?

[Chihuahua6]

I know some of you use base rock and add live rock to it. Has anyone done this without adding live rock? Perhaps sand with detrivore kits and base rock? Or has anyone used mostly base rock with a very small amount of live rock? I would hate to pay for live rock and get crappy stuff like I received today. My last set up was purchased from someone who had it running for over a year and the rock was gorgeous. I'm not sure what to do when I get my 400 gal. I know I will be purchasing a lot of base rock, sand and some good detrivore kits. I was going to add live rock too but I'm not sure how much would be necessary.

 

[Rendos]

I started my 90 gallon in April 2005 with 100% base rock. This is what it looked like then.

This is it now.

All the life came as hitchhikers on coral frags, etc.

 

[Deadmullet]

WOW, great looking tank

 

[stros]

Afriend of mine started his tank with lace rock and added two pieces of live rock. Now it all is live rock. Cannot tell the difference.
Mark

 

[Shroom King]

I started my previous 38G with 60lbs of dry rock from Hirocks.com, and then bought 5lbs of nice fiji from my LFS. I will do it again on the next tank.

 

[Chihuahua6]

Wow Rendos! That says it all.
To everyone: Did you find you needed to stock slowly? Did you seed your sand?

 

[Deadmullet]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=6849674#post6849674 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Shroom King
I started my previous 38G with 60lbs of dry rock from Hirocks.com, and then bought 5lbs of nice fiji from my LFS. I will do it again on the next tank.

great site! will definatly use this on my next set up

 

[Jon Evans]

I used about 70 lbs of base rock and 15 lbs of live rock. In under a year, you can't tell the difference. Most of my live rock came as a result of being attached to mushrooms or polyps, or else I wouldn't have bought it.