View Full Version : Does this look like good live rock or bad live rock?
MarineGirl411
01/04/2007, 08:03 PM
I just want to know if this looks like good LR or bad LR. It was supposed to be Ultra Fiji Premium. It doesn't look Premium to me. Maybe I'm wrong. What do you all think? Also, what are the black marks? Sponges? I tried scrubbing most of them off, but I see I missed quite a bit. I also have a dead peanut worm (I think) hanging out of one of the holes. Let me know. I'd really appreciate it. TY
http://i130.photobucket.com/albums/p248/GinaM411/MVC-117S.jpg
http://i130.photobucket.com/albums/p248/GinaM411/MVC-120S.jpg
http://i130.photobucket.com/albums/p248/GinaM411/MVC-114S.jpg
http://i130.photobucket.com/albums/p248/GinaM411/MVC-116S.jpg
http://i130.photobucket.com/albums/p248/GinaM411/MVC-118S-1.jpg
Wrench
01/04/2007, 08:06 PM
Hard to tell from the pics but it doesn't look too awfully bad. How did it smell? If it's bad it will smell pungent like rotting flesh. The real question is how much of the bacteria is left? That's the important stuff. You'll know once you start your cycle.
Wrench
01/04/2007, 08:10 PM
FWIW this is what my rock looked like when I first got it,
http://www.pbase.com/tonybracci/image/70709513.jpg
And this is after a month:
http://www.pbase.com/tonybracci/image/72030597.jpg
JokerGirl
01/04/2007, 08:16 PM
My rock at first:
http://img409.imageshack.us/img409/2159/img1264pn2.jpg
My rock three months later:
http://img383.imageshack.us/img383/9946/img1384yt0.jpg
It's slow but going... your rock doesn't look that bad.
MarineGirl411
01/04/2007, 08:22 PM
wow your rock looks awesome. Not it didn't smell bad at all. It smelled fresh. But does it look like Fiji Ultra Premium? My friend just told me it looks like base rock. =( For the price I paid, if it's like base rock, I'm going to be very disappointed. I also was going to add the sandbed later. Would that be alright? Then take some of the eggcrate out. I just put it in there really fast. I was up for 26 hours straight yesterday waiting on this shipment and from working. I was tired. Wrench what size tank do you have? Where did you get your lr? How did it purple up so fast? It's beautiful. What do you think those black marks are on my rock? Sponge?
Wrench
01/04/2007, 08:37 PM
I got my rock from Pacific East Aquaculture. They're a sponsor of this site. The rock was $3.70/lb and that is 70 lbs in a 45g tank. The rock had a good amount of coraline on it to start with that you can't see in the pics. The rest is a result of proper calcium levels. There's even more on it now. I have no idea what the black spots are on your rock. Do they have any texture? Could be an algae, maybe a sponge.
MarineGirl411
01/04/2007, 08:41 PM
awesome rock. Wish I would have went with them instead. I am pretty sure it's algae and dead sponge. I will have to scrub them off.
MarineGirl411
01/04/2007, 08:49 PM
Does it look like 66 pounds to you?
BTTRFLYGRL
01/04/2007, 09:05 PM
If you ever order more rock...try the Fiji or Marshall Island at Premium Aquatics..Awesome looking rock with lots of interesting shapes. You will be very pleased
casingbill
01/04/2007, 09:28 PM
I think it looks like most everybody's rock. Looks good to me.
drummereef
01/04/2007, 09:31 PM
Doesn't look like there is a ton of life on it, but other than that it looks pretty good.
MarineGirl411
01/04/2007, 09:34 PM
It was supposed to have alot of life on it. =( It was premium Ultra Fiji. Go to their website. www.livestockusa.org. Go to their Fiji Ultra Premium page. I am very disapointed. It was false representation I believe. =*( i'm very sad.
vr697getta
01/04/2007, 09:34 PM
just give it time it will color up nice its only 3 months for my lr and starting to color up with nothing added to it but zoo plankton
drillsar
01/04/2007, 10:00 PM
Doesnt look that bad but It sure dont look like the pics from there site, Complain to them and see what they say. Personally I would of gone with either premium aquactics or tampa bay saltwater great looking rock and decent price.
SaltyDr
01/04/2007, 10:03 PM
Agree with others. If you like the shapes, then be happy : ) I think it will look much better once you get sand in there and aquascape it. It should purple up in no time!
spleen93
01/05/2007, 02:49 AM
There are some interesting shapes in that batch of live rock. As others have said, LR will look very different after it's been in your tank for a while - I'd give it some time. :) The key to getting good coralline growth on your rock is to keep up your calcium/alk levels.
Spleen
aquarius77
01/05/2007, 03:00 AM
I think your rock looks very similar to what you ordered. Weight is hard to judge, some rock is very porus and other rock is super dense and heavy.
The rock looks decent to me, I personally dont like the denser rock cause it costs more to fill up your tank!
stewie24
01/05/2007, 05:00 AM
I think that looks like bad rock. You should tell it to go sit in the corner till instructed otherwise.. LOL j/k.
Like others said, it looks fine and just give it time. Be sure to keep your calc/alk/mag levels up and it should color up within a few months.
Stewie
MarineGirl411
01/05/2007, 10:21 AM
I did tell them I was disappointed. They basically told me too bad. I read on www.drmacscorals.com to do a high SG dip before placing in the tank. I did that. I did it for 3-5 min. The sg was 1.035. I wanted to kill anything bad on the rocks. Now they are saying that I killed everything. They are blaming me. So did I do something wrong? Now I'm very depressed. I cleared out a bad snail that was a coral eater and very tiny. So I think that is good, but could I have killed the rest of the life on the tank? After doing the dip, some peanut worms were still left. Some of them passed. So, did I totally screw up? When I compare their box to mine. It's totally different. You guys want to see a picture of mine compared to theirs?
casingbill
01/05/2007, 10:27 AM
It will be fine. Just let it sit in the tank and cycle. Dont get worked up about it. Mine didn't have much life on it either, but the bacteria is what is importand and how it looks in the tank. It will take a while for stuff to start showing up.
luke33
01/05/2007, 10:33 AM
It'll color up. It not impressive when you first get it sometimes. And i wouldn't worry about killing everything with your high sg dip. No worries, just give it time and you'll start to see some serious life. Mine is unbelievable with hom much life is in it. Tons of copods, amphods, 4 brittle stars, a few blue leg hermits, tons of coraline. Sponge, and even a red shroom. But i got to hand pic mine from extreme aquariums.
danieljames
01/05/2007, 10:47 AM
Marinegirl....
I purchased what was suppose to be 75 lbs of the deepwater vavau from the same place. They sent me 50 lbs and then he tried to convince me that 25 lbs of water had either drained or evaporated from the rock in transit from tonga, and that this was completely normal. There is no customer service with this place imo. "Too bad" is exactly the attitude i received as well. I was very unhappy with my experience from www.livestockusa.org. Your taking a chance imo when ordering from this company.
reefshadow
01/05/2007, 01:01 PM
Leave bad feedback for them on the FB forum if you haven't already...
FWIW, I don't think it looks nearly as good as what their pics advertise, BUT if you paid the advertised 3 bucks a pound it's not bad. NOT ultra premium IMO however.
I like to buy my LR from LFS, or folks breaking their tanks down... I've gotten very good deals and can see exactly what i'm getting.
I'm sure it will look fly in the next few months.
MarineGirl411
01/05/2007, 03:14 PM
Well daniel I think that is just plain mean of them. I'm mad at them for my rock and you should be mad too. Are you going to complain? I am. I am very upset. The too bad deal they are giving us is complete nonsense. Not fair. The Website I got the sg dip from ships from the exact same place this guy does. They recommended that dip and this guy said I killed all my creatures because of the high dip. He said the LR should only cure in 1.021 water. That's on the low end of the scale right people? Isn't it supposed to be 1.025?
WendyMc
01/05/2007, 03:21 PM
Yes, please post a shot of your rock in the box. I think your rock will color up and I don't think everything was killed in the high-salinity dip. Eventually I think you will end up with some nice looking rock it will just take a little longer. Getting that snail out could have saved you alot of potential stress, money, and ill feelings about the hobby in general in the long run. Just think how it would have felt if you put your prized specimens in your tank only to watch them slowly fade away for some unknown reason?
However, what you see on the site has such nice, open, varied structures, and what you have in your tank is pretty closed and -IMO- boring structures. The rock on that site is also about 2/3 covered in coralline algae. I can't see much at all on yours. I think that is a disappointment and a misrepresentation of the rock you purchased.
Wrench, when you got your LR from Pacific East did you do the High-salinity dip they write about on their LR page? Just curious, it is really awesome how great yours looks after only a month!
danieljames
01/05/2007, 03:47 PM
It's not a total loss Marinegirl. That rock you have will most definately color up. With a good eye for aquascaping you should be fine. Don't sweat the dip you performed. I don't think it did much damage to your rock, if any. .035 is not a crazy sg for such a short time as a dip. You just learned a valuable lesson regarding many online vendors (there are several that are very good. Check the vendor forum here for some with excellent reputations).
The best thing you can do is leave feedback (tactfully imo) for them in the vendor forum here on rc.
SuperNerd
01/05/2007, 04:13 PM
<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=8903240#post8903240 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by MarineGirl411
I read on www.drmacscorals.com to do a high SG dip before placing in the tank. I did that. I did it for 3-5 min. The sg was 1.035. I wanted to kill anything bad on the rocks. Now they are saying that I killed everything. They are blaming me. So did I do something wrong? Now I'm very depressed.
High or low SG dips done long enough will most likely kill many things on the LR, both good and bad.
It's possible that you killed many things but that doesn't mean the entire rock is devoid of life. Some stuff will come back but not everything. I wouldn't do it again in the future though. I always thought the more diversity and life the better, especially when it comes to a DSB. If something bad came in on the rock you can always remove it later.
fuzzyt
01/05/2007, 04:20 PM
After some time, 2 weeks to a month, you'll see the beginnings of the LIVE in the rock. You'll probably get some small feather dusters, macro-algae and lots of worms. A lot of things will begin to sprout up, not just purple coraline. While the bacteria will take care of the nitrites and nitrates in the water, there will also be life that helps take care of the cleaning of the tank. Its really amazing to watch it all develop, but you have to be patient. After all the life on the rock has been through to get into your tank, a high-salinity dip won't finish it off. Much of the life is buried deep within and still burrowing. Within a month, you will be amazed at everything going on, and it only gets better. :)
JokerGirl
01/05/2007, 08:54 PM
I will have to agree with Fuzzy. For the first month of having my LR, it was just like looking at rock in water. After about the first couple weeks to a month, suddenly things I had never seen before appeared out of no where. Feather dusters, sponges, worms, and TONS of pods. Now when you turn the lights out in my tank and look in with a flashlight, if you stare at the sand for a few seconds, it begins to move much like the 3D puzzle photos in the newspaper.
I wouldn't be too upset over your rock. It may look dull now but it'll come to life, and no one said you can't add more rock later that has a little bit more shape to it :)
trpigg
01/05/2007, 09:33 PM
MARINEGIRL
http://i144.photobucket.com/albums/r182/trpigg/PB230030.jpg
This was a month and a half after i purchased my live rock. I actually purchased it through a site (cant remember the site) that i got forward to from ebay. Ebay has really good deals you just have to search for them. It was a common web site that i hear quite frequently. They were running the special on a 50lb box of tonga deep water for $179.99 and that was shipped 2nd day shipping included.
after 3 months or so...i couldnt count the nuber of feather dusters that started popping up. Many different types of life forms and much needed benificial bacteria.
Ebay isn't the best place when it comes to advanced reefers but sometimes you can find excelent deals along with quality stuff. Keep your eyes open and dont rush into buying anything right away
MarineGirl411
01/12/2007, 04:48 AM
It would be nice to be able to pick out your own live rock. The shapes will not allow for great aquascaping. It's going to be hard.
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