Cooking Live Rock - Exact Process?

[coraline401]

Already 90 gal. has positive results with 1/4 LR nice and stark-porous..

 

[hurleycr]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=10771718#post10771718 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Teremei
My reason is I used a 55 gallon rubbermaid container and because I had so much LR and water it bowed and cracked and spilt all over my rug. I lost alot of interesting corals that were kind of growing out of the rockwork.

In other words. I lost more than I gained. When I was done the rocks looked white, ugly, and dead. Before than they were full of color and critters. So summing up , I don't mind a little nuisance stuff here and there and am a fan of keeping all the crazy stuff on the rocks.

oh I see.

I was just wondering if the process it self didn't work for you. Its more of an asethic thing for you. NOt that cooking the rock itself didn't accomplish the overall goal. Did your coraline not come back?

 

[Teremei]

coraline came back fine because I bought 2 expensive showpeice rocks. The cooked rocks are looking better some still look dead.

 

[Shouse94]

Sorry if this has been asked already but how long do you need to wait if any before being able to add fish after cooking the liverock?
I just got my rock back in the tank after 2 months and would like to add fish ASAP.
thanks

 

[hurleycr]

well if it was done correctly you shouldn't have a cycle, better yet if you do it should be a very small one.

however, with that said. test your water and see.

I would wait at least a week just to be safe, but if you did it right you shouldn't have killed the bacteria, just the algae.

Some can chime in and tell you the science behind it.

 

[Shouse94]

thanks hurleycr, that's what i figured.

 

[henrystyle]

I recently broke down my 90 gallon freshwater tank. I took the rocks out of there and Im going to reuse them in my new reef setup....
I put the rocks in a rubbermaid bin, filled it with tap water and added some bleach. The rocks were covered with green algae and crap. The next day the rocks looked just like when I first bought them. CLEAN! My question is what should be my next step to get the rocks ready to go into my new reef setup?
I was planning on rinsing them good then letting them sit in saltwater with a heater and powerhead going... Should I cover the rubbermaid while doing this??
Really concerned about getting the phosphates out of the rock. I have coraline covered live rock from my 30 gallon reef that I can seed this freshwater rock with...
Let me know what you think I should do.......

 

[Mitchell_2004]

Hey guys been away from the hobby now for about a year cause my system decided to get Green Hair alage out the butt and killed everything.. All my live rock has just been sitting in my bare/empty tank.. Along with the sand.. Havent had any time to do anything with it.. Buuut I wanna get back into it...Do i need to "cook" the LR? Orr can I just do a looong cycle phase and just do water changes twice a month for say 4 months? I know the live rock isnt alive anymore, and I do plan on seeding it once its ready to go, but just didnt know if i need to "cook" or just refill with RO/DI h20 and let it cycle..

Thx guys.. Glad to be back!

 

[tabwyo]

My reason is I used a 55 gallon rubbermaid container and because I had so much LR and water it bowed and cracked and spilt all over my rug. I lost alot of interesting corals that were kind of growing out of the rockwork.

Just wondering why you "cooked" rock with the coral still attatched??? The whole point is to completely shut down all photosynthesis. And the shift from a photosynthetic to a bacterial driven conditions would consume the nuetrients loaded in the rock while killing off anything that requires light. Why in the world would you put corals that require light to survive in an extended black out situation and expect anything less than total loss???

 

[tabwyo]

Mitchell,

IMO, cooking would probably be the easiest. If this rock was in your previous system or any length of time it will have plenty of left over crap in the rock which could wind up just feeding another aglae explosion in your new system.

Soak it for 24 hours in regular old tap, srub the heck out of it to get off the dead stuff, toss it in a dark tub with SW and let nature take it's course. Use a heater if yo are keeping the container in a cold area and use a simple airlift stylewater circulator to keep the water mving in the container. At first it's going to cycle while the rock recolonizes. You'll need to run you regular ammonia & nite tests o see when this is finished. After that you can get a couple pieces of LR from a friend or from the store. Buy for the shape. You want what's in the rock, not on it. Or you can get a bacterial supplament like ProdiBio. This will introduce the bacteria and other critters that will feed on the stuff locked up in the rock. The same stuff that the HA wold out compete the bacteria for in a illuminated system. I think you can do all of this in the four months you mentioned and be well ahead of the situation at the end of it.

I am currently using this process to seed and cook 80 pounds of dry base rock. Which is basically what you have now. But yours is much worse off because it's loaded with crap that died off hen you dried it out. But I am also cooking the base just in case there are any locked up organics and what not in it that may feed an algae infestation in my new system (have to move, might as well start fresh). Kind ofthe "ounce of prevention is better than pound of cure" type deal.

 

[dja1980]

I read this entire thread last week and started the cooking process last night.

I can't remember if it was asked or not, but would it be ok to do the dunking and swishing in RO/DI water (no salt) before placing back in saltwater? I figure this would save a ton on salt costs, and I can't imagine this would "kill" the rock since it would only be out of saltwater for a few seconds.

 

[createyourown]

I read this entire thread last week and started the cooking process last night.

I can't remember if it was asked or not, but would it be ok to do the dunking and swishing in RO/DI water (no salt) before placing back in saltwater? I figure this would save a ton on salt costs, and I can't imagine this would "kill" the rock since it would only be out of saltwater for a few seconds.

I think that the ro water only would kill the LR, but im not sure.

 

[prodman]

I read this entire thread last week and started the cooking process last night.

I can't remember if it was asked or not, but would it be ok to do the dunking and swishing in RO/DI water (no salt) before placing back in saltwater? I figure this would save a ton on salt costs, and I can't imagine this would "kill" the rock since it would only be out of saltwater for a few seconds.

I think there is a big difference between being out of the salt water and being dunked into ro water. I would not not do that. Cooking rock as described by seant works great if its done as described. Taking shortcuts is were people run into trouble.

 

[dja1980]

Thanks guys... I might experiment with this a little since I'm not in any hurry.

I'm about to do my 3rd swish/dunk and 2nd water change tonight. I suppose it will be obvious if the process isn't working.

 

[thewire]

pour boil water to live rock and let it sit in fresh water for a week..then let it sit dry for a couple weeks do it outside the house

 

[dja1980]

Thanks for the suggestion thewire, but I'm trying to increase bacteria populations on my rock and let them do the work. If I use your method, I would end up with dead rock, which I would really like to avoid.

 

[5ft24]

My live rock had been in a styrofoam ice chest for 2 months before I got it, and the dude kept it wet with his garden hose...
I rinsed it in saltwater and put it in a tub of saltwater, fired up a pump and heater and let it go... a couple days later, the pump had fried and the water was 140 degrees!!!
did a 100% water change and put in a new pump, and the water cycled in about 3 days... It sat with weekly 50% WC's until a couple weeks ago, and within 4 days it had spots of Coralline algae on it, and a tiny sponge!
Tank Cycled in 2 days!

 

[percula99]

I have been cooking my live rock for about six weeks now. I swished and cleaned the live rock twice the first week and once a week since then. So far the water has been a thick cloudy green or brown every time I have swished and cleaned the rock. Last night my water was black after doing this. There was a black rim on the big garbage can I soak the rock in that I had to use a scrub brush to get off. It even left a blackish stain on the white bristles of the brush. I can either assume this is a really good thing as the cleaning process has reached deep into the rock and is expelling all the foul crud that was causing my hair algae problem, or this is a bad thing because you are not supposed to get this type of result.

A lot of my rock was up to eleven years old in an often heavily stocked 180. I had developped a real bad hair algae problem. The rock in the garbage cans now stll has lots of coraline algae on it with a few rocks still having a mustard yellow sponge stuck to it. Edges of the rock are turning white.

Any ideas as to whether this result is a bad thing or natural are welcome.

 

[gillies]

I'm suprised this concept is still around. I tried it about fours years back to rid myself of aptaisa. Bad results for me. Took my tank apart and kept all my corals and fish in a Rubbermaid stock tank while the rock cooked for 10 weeks. Followed the traditional process of scrubbing and blowing off the rocks regularly, changing water, and keeping them in the dark. During the process I lost 2/3 of my mature coral colonies from the compromised stock tank setup and, when I put the tank back together, the aptasia came right back. I'll never do that again.

These days with so many folks extolling the virtues of dry, dead rock seeded with live sand and minimal live rock, I will approach the idea of cooking my rock like this:

Take it all out, scrub it with a brush and pressure wash it with the garden hose, let it sit in the AZ sun for a few days to dry thoroughly, and then replace it in the system seeded with some live sand and a few small pieces of live rock to cycle. Heck of a lot shorter wait than the 10 weeks cooking, and I'm fairly certain everything I was trying to kill has been eliminated. As always, you didn't pay for this advice, so take it for what it's worth.

 

[percula99]

Gillies, as far as I know cooking live rock was not intended to rid your tank of aptaisia, but to flush out the nitrate and phosphate that fuels hair algae outbreaks. There are natural methods of ridding your tank of aptaisia, like a Copperband, or my personal favorite, Heniochus Diphreutes. Other Butterflies might also work. Peppermint shrimp I beleive are also effective. I have filled a syringe with vinegar and squirted small amounts on the pest and watched it burn up immediately. Don't use too much though as vinegar is acidic and could change your Ph. I beleive some people use Joe's juice for that as well.

Let's not change the focus of this thread. I only intended this post as info for Gillies. I hope this helps you.