Live Rock to dead rock + cooking

Fitz19d

Bat Fish
M.A.S.C Club Member
#1
Alright, my new liverock has a more serious bubble algae problem than I thought. Between that and some majano's I'm thinking rather than try to keep this all live in buckets and an overfilled tank. I can keep maybe a few pristine peices but sun dry the rest.

I was wondering if I understood the process I need to follow right...

Live rock out in sun, allow to dry.

Soak for a day or two in either bleach or vinegar water, scrub.

Sun dry.

Rinse in water + dry again.

Final rinse and dry.

Either add to DT and begin cycling with other liverock to help seed (or go ahead and run it a month or 2 in stock tank w/ heater and flow.) ??
 

Andrew_bram

Tiger Shark
M.A.S.C Club Member
#2
Live Rock to dead rock + cooking

I say bleach for couple days, scrub the crap out of it rinse rinse rinse then let dry. Get some live sand and get tank running.
 

FinsUp

According to my watch, the time is now.
M.A.S.C Club Member
#3
Scrub, bleach, rinse, soak in Prime (dechlorinator) for a few hours, rinse, rinse, rinse, then let dry. Put in tank with live sand and/or live rock. Add some 'tank food' (pieces of shrimp, etc) regularly to cycle. Test and do water changes while cycling. During this phase, you can save some money by getting 'used' water from a fellow member, if you want. When numbers are within range, add livestock.
 

Fitz19d

Bat Fish
M.A.S.C Club Member
#5
One big question that would make it easier to just restart the rock, can I save sponges? Have these large grey/black snot or slug looking sponges and others. I'd like to try pulling them off and dumping them in sump or under a rock? Can they survive being removed if I'm not puncturing/ripping?


More thoroughly kill certain spores and anemones I can hear survive ridiculous stuff. (Like after a month drying survive in some inner tiny bit of water and return w/ a vengeance). Also otherwise help remove all the ugly gunk, open up the pores for the new bacteria once cyling it all over.

I've seen bleach option which for sure needs to be well rinsed then air dried in sun. I'm open to vinegar too though worried wouldn't I be causing some melting of any aragonite/calcium based rockwork?
 

FinsUp

According to my watch, the time is now.
M.A.S.C Club Member
#6
andyrm66;245055 said:
Why bleach?
You use bleach to ensure all stuff on the rock is dead. Cleansed. Eradicated entirely. Then you use a dechlorinator (I prefer Prime) to remove the bleach from the rocks. I wouldn't trust just rinsing them.

Fitz- I wouldn't worry about trying to save the sponges. The cycle your tank will undoubtedly go through would kill them, provided they survived the transfer to the new tank. If you do want to keep them (perhaps there's a sentimental attachment? JK) then make sure they don't touch air.
 

asn-naso

Dolphin
M.A.S.C Club Member
#7
If you are mostly concerned about the bubble algae, why not try to keep the good stuff alive, and put all of the rock into some trash cans, with lid, and throw in a bunch of emerald crabs to eat the bubble algae. The lack of light would cease the growth, as the crabs enjoy one of their favorite foods.
 

jda123

Dolphin
M.A.S.C Club Member
#8
You will have a serious cycle. If you do kill the rock, I would cycle them outside of the tank since you will fill the tank up with nutrients as stuff dies. I would trash-can cycle the rock. You cannot really scrub off all of the stuff down a bit deeper that will die.

Emeralds will crush bubble algae when the lights are on. Any type of algae can come in unseen at any time, so have a plan for when they come back. I have an emerald or two in every tank.
 

jda123

Dolphin
M.A.S.C Club Member
#9
If you are set on killing the rock, read up on using Muratic Acid. It dilutes down better than bleach and does a better job. It is cheap too.

If you just want to kill 'nems and some bubble algae, then a propane torch can also get it done.
 

asn-naso

Dolphin
M.A.S.C Club Member
#10
BTW - I have 2 trash cans that are practically brand new. I used them to move my rock, then keep the rock alive in, while I setup my new tank. I'd make you a killer deal on them.
 

Fitz19d

Bat Fish
M.A.S.C Club Member
#11
Where are you at asneiman. I'd consider it. The majano's may be a bigger concern than the bubble. I guess I need to post pics of the rocky. Sorta gnarly. Some have just a almost sludgy build up of old algae.
Emeralds I've been told can be hit or miss on the bubble, then again I guess if they are hungry enough. But with 200lbs of this that is just saturated. I don't know how long they would take. (And again moving in a month so either have to hold rock till then and worry about it after I move which is the big hassle to transport them live in addition to everything else)

Everythings in a tank or a tub right now except a few pieces which I couldnt fit and are on porch. So I'll have to deal with cleaning up at least some of them.

I was thinking for cooking them for a few weeks after clean up if I could get a cheap plastic kiddy pool in the basement, have my little lagoon going w/ powerheads and a heater. Then easy to grab individual rocks to inspect and eventually start aquascaping.
 

jda123

Dolphin
M.A.S.C Club Member
#12
Check craigs list for some old plastic food barrells. I have a few that had iodine and shrimp brine in them. They are great for cooking rocks, RO reservoirs, water changes and general awesomeness. They are usually around 10-20 bucks.

FWIW - I have never seen a emerald miss on bubble algae. I have seen them start eating it less than a minute after being dropped into the tank. If you have a lot, it can take them a few weeks, but IME they always crush it.
 

Fitz19d

Bat Fish
M.A.S.C Club Member
#14
DTC a bit of a drive for me.


As far as the sponges. I know air not good, but I've got rocks that survived in ziplocks with water. Were in air from one container to next. Think some of my original rock which was pretty exposed survived. These though then I don't know as over an hour they were plucked and put into my buckets, then taken home and another wait as I got some of their water ready. So maybe the sponges all dead already?
 

Fitz19d

Bat Fish
M.A.S.C Club Member
#15
Heres a pic


Other parts have much much larger bits of bubble.

If I did go for emeralds. Anywhere better than reefs2go? (I think like 3.50 each if bought in 2's but unknown $ on shipping may make it not a great price.)
 

andyrm66

Butterfly Fish
#16
Bleach, acid? Why not just let them sit in the sun and dry fully for a few days. I know you can remove the bleach with Prime or dechlor, but why add stuff that's not really needed? Guess its difference of opinion, not a big deal really.
Although..... if people went to the same amount of trouble prophylactically treating and QT'ing fish as they do screwing around with rock, you'd see a hellava lot less lost fish due to disease.
 

Fitz19d

Bat Fish
M.A.S.C Club Member
#17
I think the idea with that stuff is to break down and melt away the dead gunk inside the rock as well as out.. Scrub off what you can and with multiple rinses etc get it pretty cleaned up so you can cook it a few weeks and be good.

This stuff if I dried it out and then put in a new tank I think would be 6months cycling.

Sick bastard in my wants to save some of the kinda pretty majano's and put with my monster big one in sump. (which I wonder if it's a majano now since they are so drastically different looking.)
 

FinsUp

According to my watch, the time is now.
M.A.S.C Club Member
#18
Re: Live Rock to dead rock + cooking

Research dead organics and phosphates, andyrm66. Just drying out rock and putting it back in your system is a great way to cause yourself problems. But to each his own.

Sent from my LS670 using Tapatalk 2
 

deboy69

Nurse Shark
M.A.S.C Club Member
#19
Re: Live Rock to dead rock + cooking

andyrm66;245133 said:
Bleach, acid? Why not just let them sit in the sun and dry fully for a few days. I know you can remove the bleach with Prime or dechlor, but why add stuff that's not really needed? Guess its difference of opinion, not a big deal really.
Although..... if people went to the same amount of trouble prophylactically treating and QT'ing fish as they do screwing around with rock, you'd see a hellava lot less lost fish due to disease.
Muratic acid eats the outer part of the rock which is what contains phosphates. You can sun dry it and it will leach phosphates for X amount of time until they are gone. I muratic acid wash all my rock, power wash to get it clean and all the crud out of crevices and let is sit in the sun for a few days so the chlorine ecan off gas. No problems.

If you want sponges you can always get a rock from someone or find a rock with a bunch sponges keep that alive and let it spread when you add it. Just my. 02

Sent from Earth
 
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