cookin rocks

Tank or container with no light.... Powerhead(s) and a heater at the proper temp 78-80. Leave the rock in the vat for as long as you can stand it. 6-8 weeks. Do 50% water changes every 7-10 days. When you do the water change, take the old discard water and put it into 2-3 buckets. Remove the rock from the holding container and swish it around in the buckets progressively in the same order with each rock. The first bucket will get very nasty with gunk. You are cleaning detritus and dissolved organics off the rock.

In about 6 weeks your rock will be very low in dissolved nutrients and ready to start in a tank. This process eliminates most unwanted algae.
 
in a nut shell:

-take rock out of tank and dunk in bucket of clean SW, swoosh it around to get as much junk out of it.

-place it into a container that will 100% dark but allowing air to get in. ie: Rubbermaid with a piece of plywood over it. have powerhead in there agitating the water surface to allow origination and a heater.

-do periodic water changes blowing off and sucking up the junk that will come out of the rocks.

-keep doing this for um..... someone help me with the length of time..... was it a month??

anyways, that will get you started and there are some better instructions somewhere on here if you do a search.
 
is it that important to maintain temp i wanted to do this on the covered side of our deck . water temp would most likely go up into the 90's on some days.
 
Yeah, if the temp gets too high, I'd think you may kill off the bacteria inside the rock. You may end up with non "live" rock and just base rock.....

A garage would be a better option where there is no direct sun and it would stay cooler. I would'nt let it get above 85 at the highest level.
 
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