Bringing Dead Rock Back to Life

[yetiman]

I have about 100lbs of excellent looking dried up live rock. I can see dried up worms and other life on the rock. I'm installing the rock in a new start up tank, is there anything special I should expect or do? I was just going to fill the tank with the rocks in it and let them do there thing. Do I need to cook the rocks. Thanks for the help

 

[Misled]

When I did mine, I took them outside and rinsed them really good with a hose. Them put them in a tank and did frequent water changes for a couple weeks. I also had lights over them and ran a skimmer full time. Then add some fresh rubble from the LFS and let it go!!!!

 

[SaltyDr]

It would probably be easier to put the rocks in a big brute garbage can with a heater and a powerhead and let them "stew" for a couple of weeks, doing frequent partial water changes. If there are a bunch of dead stuff on the rocks, it going to come off and is easier to deal with if in a garbage can than in the tank. After that, add to tank with sand a few small pieces of live rock and let the cycle continue for the next month or so. When ammonia is at zero add a clean up crew and SLOWLY add livestock after that.

 

[-=Efrain=-]

If you want to speed things up a little you can take a clean brush to the rock and clean off as much of the dead stuff as you can..

 

[seapug]

I used some old "once live rock" when I started my last tank. I used it as base rock and added some new truly "live" pieces on top to givbe it a new "seed". Within a couple weeks the coralline started coming back and the microfanuna was inhabiting it once again.

 

[REEFKEEPA]

This is exactly what I am doing as we speak.
The rock that was in my tank prior to Katrina has been dried and re seeded and then dried again.
The rock is white except for some Tonga branch that kept some purple algae bumps.
I got all new live sand 150LBS and some new RAW uncured rock 30LBS to put on top.
I don't know what will happen but I have learned my lesson about wanting this stuff to happen overnight.
I am running the tank dark for the next month or two concentrating on ALK and CAL.....

 

[SaltyDr]

If you are in the dark, your Ca demand should be very low. You should get by on water changes alone.

 

[REEFKEEPA]

Yea You Right!!!

 

[REEFKEEPA]

Who Dat????

 

[REEFKEEPA]

CA demand is what it is.
I like to force the issue......

 

[SaltyDr]

????

 

[shaginwagon13]

The last 4 posts confused me....haha

 

[yetiman]

I'm just a little concerned what might shed off the rock as it cures and about an algae bloom. I figure if I keep the tank dark for a couple of months I should be all right. Anything that sheds off should be easy to clean seeing that the tank is BB and has an open aquascape. Here is a picture of the rocks.