Dry rock

[dbenenh0]

Those of you who have used dry rock in the past or are currently using it I would like to hear if you cured it before you put it in your tank or just washed it off and put it in the tank. Also would like to hear if you've had any phosphate issues and how long after setup they started.

Going to try and setup a poll so will see how this goes.

 

[Bent]

Save yourself a headache and cure it.

 

[Sugar Magnolia]

I cured mine for a couple of months.

 

[dbenenh0]

I cured mine for a couple of months.

A couple months?!?! :headwally:

Not what I was wanting to hear lol. I guess its a good thing I have a 20 gal qt for fish and another 10 gal qt for coral, at least ill have something to look at while my rocks are getting ready.

 

[Bent]

A couple months?!?! :headwally:

Not what I was wanting to hear lol. I guess its a good thing I have a 20 gal qt for fish and another 10 gal qt for coral, at least ill have something to look at while my rocks are getting ready.

It could take even longer depending on how saturated it is.

You could do it on a small scale with a Tupperware container or something and see how high the po4 goes.

 

[dbenenh0]

The plan was to use Marco rock and I had read good things about it, even saw a few people who went directly into their tank with it but also came across a few that had some major HA problems and that's what I'm trying to avoid.

I guess the only real way to find out would be to put them in a can with some water and see what happens. I'm still interested to see how the results of the poll turn out.

 

[CStrickland]

There's just too many variables to predict how it will go for you. Rock source, seller, and even batch to batch, the rock will have diff amounts of phos in it.

I got mine from reefcleaners and ran it in salt water for a week to check, no phos for me. I don't see any reason not to do it right in the tank if you are starting from scratch.

Also, there's 2 diff processes. Some people "cure" the rock to build up the filtering bacteria and clean it, especially if it's the sort of dry rock that has a bunch of dead stuff on it, as opposed to clean stuff from the ground like marcorock. The phos treatments are a different goal.

 

[dbenenh0]

Let's bump this to the top to get some more responses.

 

[Zenkie83]

Dry rock

I gave mine and acid bath then did my scaping used e marco cement then I cured them for 2 months doing water changes from water from my display tank during water changes then I cycled the Rock in the new tank with a shrimp for 2 weeks then added beneficial bacteria dr tims and cycled for 2 more months while doing light feeding, so in total 4 months total before I transferred my live stock from my old tank and until now no issues what so ever

 

[dkeller_nc]

Especially because you're doing a nano, there's zero reason not to give the rock an acid bath. If there's not much phosphate, then you got the rocks wet for nothing. If there was, then you dodged a bullet in an afternoon.

Bottom Line: do it (except with 0.1 N HCl, not 1 N HCl).

 

[tommyboynj]

Iv set two tanksnup with dry rock one brs the other Marco. I didn't cure either. The brs rock was leaching po4 for month and not was a continual hair algae battle. The Marco rock has been going for about 2 months in.my new tank and no problems. Hit or miss. I should have cured the new batch really but I was to lazy... Lol.

 

[dbenenh0]

Especially because you're doing a nano, there's zero reason not to give the rock an acid bath. If there's not much phosphate, then you got the rocks wet for nothing. If there was, then you dodged a bullet in an afternoon.

Bottom Line: do it (except with 0.1 N HCl, not 1 N HCl).

DT will be a 75 so not exactly a nano but thanks for the response.

I do have 2 QT's (20 for fish 10 for coral) but neither of those will have rock in it.

 

[dkeller_nc]

Sorry - misinterpretation based on your QT tanks. Nevertheless, you can acid-wash enough rock for a typical 75g in 3 5 gallon buckets (or one bucket if you "batch" the rock).

The HCl comes from the pool supply store, and you need to dilute about 6 fluid ounces of concentrated HCl in 5 gallons of water to make 0.1N HCl.

 

[dbenenh0]

Okay thanks for the good info. Ill be sure to acid-wash the rocks before going into the DT. Hoping to order them in the next 2-3 weeks.

 

[kmcochran0010]

What do you mean acid wash?

 

[sfdan]

Once I started dosing LC I brought my rocks from having phosphate levels >30 PPM down to ~2-3 within about 2 weeks. If you are using LC there is no need to cure it for months.

If you did an acid wash first (I didn't) that would probably get the phosphate out of there even faster.

 

[Flippers4pups]

Went with Marco rock and used quikqrete hydraulic cement to build. Never had any PO4 issues. Went into the DT from day one and never had problems. Just took forever to get coralline to cover it, as expected. It's been almost a year salty.