sps tank with dead rock only

[toothman]

I had/have a 400 gallon sps tank set up for 10 yrs. Recently I had a outbreak of aefw, over the course of 10 yrs I have had redbugs, red planaria, lps flatworms, aptasia you name it.

My new thought is to just try it with only dead rock not even any seed rock. The advantage is obvious, no or minimal risk of unwanted pest introduction.

The disadvantage would be very limited biodiversity: sponges etc.

I also set up a 55 gallon isolation tank.

Any opinions on the success with this method?

 

[grant778]

While I know little about large tanks and sps, I see no reason why your plan wouldn't work. After your tank cycles you will still have bacteria built up on your rocks to break down waste. As you mentioned, you would not have sponges, and all the other interesting/good hitch hikers that come on live rock, but they aren't really necessary. Its just that many reefers like to make their tanks as diverse as possible like in the ocean, so they go for the live rock and the hitch hikers that come with it. Even without a seed rock, you would still probably get coralline algae and a small amount of biodiversity due to coralline and hitchhikers on rocks/frag plugs you buy the corals on, as well as on the shells of snails or hermit crabs.

 

[Eric Boerner]

My current SPS tank is set up this way. I started off with a ton of cultured bacteria to seed the rock and let that cook for a month. Attached a bio-reactor after a month and started overfeeding a dozen chromis. Also placed my DSB refugium with algae scrubber in the sump at that point and filled it with Macros. At month 9, 2 cryptic zones are going to be added to the refugium, a live sponge filter, and a clam bed.

I went through the typical 4 week cycle, hair algae, then cyanobacteria. Tangs and cerith snails came next. Ceriths are my primer to tell if the system is stable. If they can survive 2 weeks, then I know I'm done with cycle swings. Still had several hundred after 2 weeks, so I knew at that point I was ready for fuzzy sticks.

I placed a 2" frag of montipora digitata in at month 1 to inoculate zooxanthellae in the system. After 3 months, 100 SPS frags were popped in from various friends around the reefing community. The original montipora survived and is a 9" multi-branched colony now. The rest of the frags have doubled in size and kept all their colors.

Coralline algae has been the most difficult to foster so far. I scrapped a lot of frag plugs to seed the rock, hoping to get some color on there. It's taken 4 months, but I am starting to see purple blotches here and there now. But the rock is still pretty stark white.

I also seeded the tank with 4 species of pods and a bunch of tunicates from a friends system. Those are all doing pretty well. Once the cyptic zones go in, then I'll work on acquiring a bunch of ball sponges for that cryptic zone.

All this as an effort to keep pests out. But, as we should all know, you just can't stop all invaders. You'll still need to be diligent and watch what comes in on frags.

 

[toothman]

are you going to get cryptic sponges from steve tyree?

Thanks for the input glad to hear success with this method. I had a 55 gallon cryptic area now it is my isolation tank. I was looking at some of the flordia live rock it looks really healthy, meaning I will get a bunch of great live stuff, it may however carry the some really bad stuff also.

 

[Eric Boerner]

I did a mix of various dead rock. Some CaribSea, some Aquamaxx, some Marcorock. To be honest, I'm fairly certain its all from the same quarry. They all looked exactly the same structurally. I picked up 350 lbs in total and lashed it together with PVC pipe, tip-ties and epoxy. Personally I wouldn't pick up seeded deadrock. While you are getting a jump start on the bacteria, you're also getting a ton of pests and macro algaes on there too. But that's just my opinion.

I haven't seen Steve's tanks since I left LA. I'm sure he has tons of sponges still. I have a local area to pick up sponges and tunicates here in Seattle. Again, my own opinion, but sponges and tunicates don't do well shipped, specially in the cold. Pretty fragile little things.

 

[hydrahawk]

I plan on doing the same with the new SCA-66 SPS only tank.

 

[DNA]

toothman I've had many of the worst pests so I restarted my 400g system with dead Marco rocks, only to have it infested with the mother of all pests, dinoflagellates.
They made my reefing miserable and even after another restart they still rule the tank.
I'd really like to get rid of them. There is no cure, but I've found a way to live with them and to have some SPS success..

Many of the pests get uncontrollable because of lack of natural predation.
Lack of biodiversity just introduces unnatural selection and the random fittest organism is likely to prevail.
Humans have a long history at failing to improve nature so trying that is not likely to succeed in my opinion.

If you go the dead rock route, I can recommend it, but don't underestimate the vast amounts of calcium, alk and mg that it takes to get the rocks covered in coraline algae.
It could easily take half a year with equipment suited for your tanks size and adding corals on top of that will make them suffer.
Coraline also comes in white and is missed by many reefers since purple is the official color. Look for lack of texture to spot the white areas.

 

[unze]

My new thought is to just try it with only dead rock not even any seed rock. The advantage is obvious, no or minimal risk of unwanted pest introduction.

This is how most tanks are set up overseas.
Takes about 6 weeks to cycle the tank.

What you could also do is place all the dead rock in a bin or tank and cycle it.
then when done you could set up your tank and add corals in a few days as the rocks will have bacteria on them.

 

[toothman]

great advice

 

[Eric Boerner]

If you go the dead rock route, I can recommend it, but don't underestimate the vast amounts of calcium, alk and mg that it takes to get the rocks covered in coraline algae.

This is has a ton of validity. My calcium reactor and c02 tank are in overdrive trying to keep up with both my coral and my "white" rock. I also need to dose kalkwasser in non-photoperiods to increase my calcium and dKH. It's been 5 months, and I am just barely seeing coralline patches finally.

 

[tfp]

When I setup my tank I used all dead Marco rock too. Tried to seed it with prodibio to speed things up. It's possible but took a few months to get coraline to grow.

 

[rovster]

I used mostly dead rock. A combination of BRS Pukani and tonga. I did have a trusted local reefer seed a few pieces in his sump for a month or 2. I also got some chaeto from another source as well as a cup of sand. It has taken 4-5 months for the rock to "color up" and it continues to darken although most of it is covered in a light purple now. For 3 months it was bone white and then brown. I'm still dealing with some brown snot that looks a lot like dinos but its getting better so I'm not worried. If you are going to go through all these lengths to prevent problems, I'm assuming you will have a pretty bullet proof quarantine for all new arivals?

I was counting on 6 months of an "ugly duckling" phase but it has not been as bad as expected.

 

[jda]

Some dead rock is full of dead organics and can have phosphate issues for a long time - do your research.

Whatever you choose, just one frag can reinfest your tank with all kinds of nastiness.

 

[Eric Boerner]

Some dead rock is full of dead organics and can have phosphate issues for a long time - do your research.

One of the benefits IMHO. In addition to higher solubility of calcium and magnesium from the rock, as it leeches overtime. That will decrease after a year or so when the rock has been leech locked with coralline algae, which will take up a lot of that leeching itself.

Whatever you choose, just one frag can reinfest your tank with all kinds of nastiness.

Very true. Already finished getting through green and golden hair algae blooms from several frags.

 

[cugly]

I have done to setups already with dead rocks but I cured them and dose bacteria and let it do its thing untill all my parameters are within acceptable ranges then I started my refugium with cured rocks and macro it will take time for the tank to build proper beneficial bacteria ..and it works for me then I start adding sponges and little critters I also have a cryptic area fulll of rocks that I also cured..only thing I am waiting on to pass are the brown algae that is almost gone..

 

[Dugless]

Just because you start pest free, doesn't mean that it isn't very possible to introduce some sort of nuisance even after using dead rock. All it takes is one aiptasia or piece of algae, etc. to hitchhike discreetly into your tank when adding coral.

If your concern is to prevent this, it will take some patience and a thorough quarantine process. Even then, something might slip past.