Live sand vs live rock question ??

[sssnake]

What's the difference between 120 pounds of live sand versus 120 pounds of live rock in terms of the biological filtration aspect of it all?

What if I want to use strictly live sand and use only pieces of rock from my previous setup (which I will boil) for aquascaping purposes only? Will this have any negative impact on my system?

And since I don't want to bring any LR into my new setup will this sterilized rock eventually become "live" down the road, and if so what are the negative implications of this dead-to-live change?

Lastly, since I will be placing the live sand and salt water together as the first step when should I expect to see the start of the cycle; will this be a natural cycle; and should I expect the cycling period to run its normal course of a couple of months?

I just want to make sure that I can go, if I could, with live sand only (like Arag-alive) because I want to avoid all the possible nasties which may come with any piece of live rock.

[geekdafied]

Unless you totally scrub the rock before and after boiling, you will have water quality problems. Even after all that you may still have issues because you will not be able to scrub inside the rock.

The rock will become "alive" again. If you dose with purple up, it contains purple and pink coraline algae spores.

Here is my question to you... What do you have that is so bad on the rock?

[sssnake]

Originally Posted by geekdafied

Unless you totally scrub the rock before and after boiling, you will have water quality problems. Even after all that you may still have issues because you will not be able to scrub inside the rock.

The rock will become "alive" again. If you dose with purple up, it contains purple and pink coraline algae spores.

Here is my question to you... What do you have that is so bad on the rock?

If 10 minutes of boiling will not sterilize this rock then I'm ditching the rock altogether. This is why I'm specifically asking about using live sand. I want nothing, repeat nothing, to be used in my new setup that came from my previous tank.

If eventually the rock does become alive I would rather it do so naturally.

The rock was present in my tank when I dosed with a cyano red-slime remover which killed all my live stock, and quite possibly anything living in/on the live rock. Since then the tank was completely stripped, the crushed coral thrown out, and the rock was removed and has been sitting on my back yard patio for over a week. I don't think it would have been wise to re-use this live rock in any new setup.


Here's where I stand presently with the tank. Any residue on the glass has since been wiped "squeeky clean" :



and the rock:



I want to start preparing my water this week and buy my live sand.

I'm adopting the "better safe than sorry" attitude for my next setup.

[geekdafied]

you can sterlize it, but you will kill worms and other things inside the rock. Thus creating ammonia etc.

[geekdafied]

You can kill all the bad things, but that doesnt remove them from the rock.

[Tangster]

man you can make this as complicated as you want but just soak it in bleach and water for a few day rinse soak it for a day or so then set it out to dry for a few days. Its that simple . Why even use Live sand will you be quarantining for a few months ? I did not see that mentioned anywhere ..no telling what type of larva would be in the sand .

[geekdafied]

prepackaged livesand cant support anything but bacteria. There is no gas exchange of any kind unless there is a hole in the bag. The livesand comes vacuum sealed with a very little water in it (or the carib sea stuff does).

[djnzlab1]

Hey,
Why not buy dead rock and dead sand and cycle the mess together, I have added 30-40 pounds of clean white coral to my tank and let it cycle with the live rock, its already turning a little purple and the shrimp love hidding in it.
Unless you buy live rock at a LPS its gonna be dead rock and smelly by the time you get it in the mail.
I started a new tank with dead sand and new rock added 5 pounds of live sand from the LPS and let it cycle with a little meat . Its much cheeper and it seeems to cycle faster with the fresh live sand, the critters just move out into the system I feed small amount of flake food for any inverts that may be in the live sand. And let it stew..
I have taken a real interest in the miracle-mud-reforguims, it seems like a darn good idea.
Anyone else testing this.
Doug

[Pro]

Originally Posted by sssnake

If 10 minutes of boiling will not sterilize this rock then I'm ditching the rock altogether. This is why I'm specifically asking about using live sand. I want nothing, repeat nothing, to be used in my new setup that came from my previous tank.

If eventually the rock does become alive I would rather it do so naturally.

The rock was present in my tank when I dosed with a cyano red-slime remover which killed all my live stock, and quite possibly anything living in/on the live rock. Since then the tank was completely stripped, the crushed coral thrown out, and the rock was removed and has been sitting on my back yard patio for over a week. I don't think it would have been wise to re-use this live rock in any new setup.

Here's where I stand presently with the tank. Any residue on the glass has since been wiped "squeeky clean"

LiveRock can live through some harsh conditions

[Otty]

My rock looked like this before I done Tangster's 50/50 bleach, rinse, then water and baking soda treatment. It will kill all that crap on the rocks, you will see it floating about day 2 on the bleach soak. Isn't nothing living through that....
Nasty rock

Clean Rock