Live Rock from PETCO

I have a couple pieces from them and no complaints. I did notice at one location their rock was crawling with bristle worms. I see that as a good sign though some may not.

 

did it take a long time to cycle? also did you have to clean it or anything like that? did you start your aquarium new with it?

 

Check your nitrate and phosphate levels if you add their rock. Their fish manager here said that none of the stores are allowed to have an RO/Di filter per the district managers. So the SW they sell and their tanks get faucet water that has sometimes been filtered with carbon, sometimes not even that. Which explains why they always have cyano. I also only have a good survival rate from them if I use a very extended acclimation time 8 - 10 hours

 

If your getting it from petco, then order it online. That's where I got mine from and it was really cheap. They send you about 60 lbs for 100 bucks. It was the best deal around imho.

 

I have also heard this story a few times. I guess it depends on the petco, I would look into it

 

I would avoid it. Some have good expereinces with PETCO, and others have had bad. I think the problem is you really dont know with PETCO. You could have a great store...or your store could be like the one by my house. They are idiots over there. I would not buy anything from them...I would be concerned the rock was bad (Like I would not be at all suprised if they had it in a tank treated with copper....they are that slack at that store.). So I personally would err on the side of caution. Just my opinion though.

 

We have Petco live rock in our Pico and theres nothing at all wrong with it. Our local Petco has a very intelligent aquatics manager (dont know where or how they found him) so most of the stuff they sell is top notch. Cant say the same for all Petco stores because the majority of them seem to be pretty gross. Cant really go wrong with rock though, we got 10 pounds of it for $20 which beats paying the insane markup of $9.99 a pound at most local fish stores.

 

My local Petco has some pieces in their display tanks. It was priced by the piece and it seemed pretty inexpensive. It looked like pretty dense LR though. With any LR purchase you risk getting some nasties.

 

I got my LR from Petco Haven't been there for too much else but I didn't get any pests or anything.

 

I bought some and had no problems except it caused a diatom bloom. Last a couple of days and was gone.