can I do hypo with live base rock

[markeo99]

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here is me scenario I have a 125 gallon tank 1/2-1" of live sand and 150 pounds of base rock that is just seeded with coraline. no worms or critters to speak of. now I have ich can I do hypo with the rock in there or will just the bacteria dieoff be a big swing
oh and it is freshley seed less than 3 months old

 

[Stuart60611]

Yes you can. I am doing exactly the same thing right now under virtually the same system: 3 month old 125 fowlr with just base rock. I am in week one of hypo. No ammonia or ph problems. Your biological filter will do just fine, but you will get some die off. As such, I would suggest that you lower your salinity extremely slowly over at least a 1 week period. The advantage of this is it will not shock your biological filter as much, and it will allow for you to remove ammonia from the system each day for a week which should handle any die off. I did a 10 or so gallon water change every day for a week just adding r/o water to bring my salinity down. So far so good.