How to re-use old rock

[captmilkchoco]

Hi everyone! I have just inherited an Oceanic BioCube 29 from a buddy who moved to Australia. His tank died when he stopped taking care of it regularly. I emptied it out, tossed the old sand, but I still have a good 30ish pounds of live rock.

I honestly am not sure where and how to start with this all, but I figured I would start by prepping and cleaning the rock. What should I do with it? It's currently sitting in a bag on my balcony and has probably dried out (but covered in pink/purple blotches). Any advice would be very helpful, and I'm planning on going to my local fish store this weekend.

 

[kyle.nagel13]

Its dead rock now. I'd throw it in some RODI water, scrub the crap out of it, rinse and repeat. Then, once you arent getting anything off the exterior, throw it in a tub with some saltwater, heater, and powerhead. Change the water a couple times and it should be ready for your tank.

 

[captmilkchoco]

After I can't get anything off the exterior, can I just use the tank? It's completely empty right now...or should I use another container?

 

[kyle.nagel13]

The tank is fine.

 

[TrogdorFTW]

yeah tank is fine just plan to do an 90-100% water change to get everything out of there, I didn't and I spent a year fighting all the excess nitrate and phosphate trapped deep in the rock

 

[captmilkchoco]

So like a weekly full water change for 2-3 weeks and then actually start cycling?

 

[TrogdorFTW]

So like a weekly full water change for 2-3 weeks and then actually start cycling?

From my experience I wish I would have used a power head or a turkey baster to blow everything out of the rock while it was submerged in water then siphoned out and replaced all the water. You can repeat this process as many times as you like. I don't know that you need to wait a week in between as I'm sure you are anxious to get started on your tank and you probably know that its going to take you 4-6 weeks minimum to cycle the tank.

After you get all the crud blown out I would say you are ready to cycle. keep in mind that there are excess nutrients trapped in the rock in the form of dead organic material and possibly even extra phosphorus trapped in an inorganic lattice. that said I advise a fish-less cycle small piece of raw shrimp or some raw ammonia (make sure it has no dies fragrances or other detergents) should be able to get it at ACE rather inexpensive. go very slow with the ammonia since as I said you have extra nutrients in your dead rock.

 

[captmilkchoco]

From my experience I wish I would have used a power head or a turkey baster to blow everything out of the rock while it was submerged in water then siphoned out and replaced all the water. You can repeat this process as many times as you like. I don't know that you need to wait a week in between as I'm sure you are anxious to get started on your tank and you probably know that its going to take you 4-6 weeks minimum to cycle the tank.

After you get all the crud blown out I would say you are ready to cycle. keep in mind that there are excess nutrients trapped in the rock in the form of dead organic material and possibly even extra phosphorus trapped in an inorganic lattice. that said I advise a fish-less cycle small piece of raw shrimp or some raw ammonia (make sure it has no dies fragrances or other detergents) should be able to get it at ACE rather inexpensive. go very slow with the ammonia since as I said you have extra nutrients in your dead rock.

Thanks for the advice. I am anxious, but I want to get everything started off right!

 

[acer]

Last summer I restarted my tanks- reused old dried rock just fine. However, I went the extra yard and after physically cleaning via toothbrush and spaying. I then put the rock in a rubbermaid or some other container- with a few power heads and added about 1/2 up per gallon straight normal bleach for 3 days. The bleach acids sterilizes the rock pretty well. Some said use Mironic acid (spell?) = the stuff that washes brick clean. But that stuff is a bit dangerous.

 

[captmilkchoco]

Last summer I restarted my tanks- reused old dried rock just fine. However, I went the extra yard and after physically cleaning via toothbrush and spaying. I then put the rock in a rubbermaid or some other container- with a few power heads and added about 1/2 up per gallon straight normal bleach for 3 days. The bleach acids sterilizes the rock pretty well. Some said use Mironic acid (spell?) = the stuff that washes brick clean. But that stuff is a bit dangerous.

Thanks for the idea...I'll probably be scrubbing them up, bleaching them for a couple days in a 50-50 solution (with a powerhead or 2), then doing a soak in RODI, water change until my phosphate levels have dropped. If this is good or bad, any advice would be nice.

What about drying them out in the sun? I'm in Miami, so I have the luxury of doing that too...any thoughts?

 

[OrQidz]

You might look at techniques people are using on dried rock to leach phosphate. I honestly wouldn't know if your rock is loaded with phosphate or not. Kind of depends on whether the previous owner let it get saturated with a lot of nutrients. If the tank was just neglected but not over fed it might not be too bad. If it was a yucky algae filled mess, that might be another matter though.

Bleach will certainly kill stuff, although I'm not sure you need to try to sterilize the rock since it's already dried out. Bleach is however, not an acid and I haven't heard that it can remove phosphates.

I think what people use is muriatic acid, which is indeed an acid and indeed very nasty stuff.

I have a BC29 too and it's a lot of fun. Good luck and enjoy getting it set up and running!

 

[acer]

OOPPS YEP- bleach is a base/alkaline I just did not think- just remembered bleach irritating skin/eyes like an acid. - but does kill pretty much anything.

Good catch OrQidz.....

 

[captmilkchoco]

You might look at techniques people are using on dried rock to leach phosphate. I honestly wouldn't know if your rock is loaded with phosphate or not. Kind of depends on whether the previous owner let it get saturated with a lot of nutrients. If the tank was just neglected but not over fed it might not be too bad. If it was a yucky algae filled mess, that might be another matter though.

Bleach will certainly kill stuff, although I'm not sure you need to try to sterilize the rock since it's already dried out. Bleach is however, not an acid and I haven't heard that it can remove phosphates.

I think what people use is muriatic acid, which is indeed an acid and indeed very nasty stuff.

I have a BC29 too and it's a lot of fun. Good luck and enjoy getting it set up and running!

Yeah, I've been looking around. Seems like a long RO soak with a couple powerheads is a good solution. Might take some time, water changes, and I'll throw in a bag of phosguard, but seems like the easiest way, albeit time consuming.

 

[captmilkchoco]

You might look at techniques people are using on dried rock to leach phosphate. I honestly wouldn't know if your rock is loaded with phosphate or not. Kind of depends on whether the previous owner let it get saturated with a lot of nutrients. If the tank was just neglected but not over fed it might not be too bad. If it was a yucky algae filled mess, that might be another matter though.

Bleach will certainly kill stuff, although I'm not sure you need to try to sterilize the rock since it's already dried out. Bleach is however, not an acid and I haven't heard that it can remove phosphates.

I think what people use is muriatic acid, which is indeed an acid and indeed very nasty stuff.

I have a BC29 too and it's a lot of fun. Good luck and enjoy getting it set up and running!

Also, not enough posts to send you a direct message but I was wondering if you had any tips or tricks about the BC29 itself? One thing I did notice was that the fan(s) are pretty loud...did you do anything to alleviate this?

 

[captmilkchoco]

An update and question: I've soaked the rocks in a 50-50 bleach solution for about 48 hours and taken them out to dry outside for a bit here. I'm planning on letting them soak in RO water with a powerhead and doing weekly water changes until my nitrates and phosphates go to 0.

After that, I'm planning on putting them into the tank and starting the cycle. If they are "dead," how can I seed them to start a cycle? If I get live sand, will that be enough to get it going? Or should I get a small amount of live rock to add to the system?

Any help would be appreciated!

 

[ljosh]

I would use a piece of liverock to seed the rest.

Unless you are worried about picking up unknown bad hitch-hikers from the liverock then you might want purchase some bottled bacteria to seed your current rock.

 

[captmilkchoco]

I would use a piece of liverock to seed the rest.

Unless you are worried about picking up unknown bad hitch-hikers from the liverock then you might want purchase some bottled bacteria to seed your current rock.

I think my buddy left behind a bottle of BioSpira, probably start with that. After adding that, do I ghost feed or add some pieces of shrimp to start the cycle then?

Sorry for all the questions; I just want to get everything started off right...