How much will die curing live rock?

[sid101]

I bought 20 pounds of maricultured live rock saturday, the tank was suposed to be already up and runing so i could cure it inside it but the stand started to lean forward so i had to take the water out untill the "blacksmith" (i am spanish speaking so i dont know how its called XD) comes today to make measurements to make a metal stand instead of the mdf one that came with my tank (sera marin 130), so when i got the LR i put it all on my bucked with a powerhead and started curing it there with plans to continue the process in the tank once the stand is done, the rock is soooo gorgeous with sooooo much in them, zooanthids, pods of all types, many worms, dustfeathers, porcelain, mithrax and harlequin crabs, many snails even one sand sifting shrimp!!! but sadly it also brought some pistol and mantis shrimp with it, i took out 1 mantis, 2 pistols and one gorilla crab with the freshwater trick and i know of at least one mantis and one pistol shrimp that are still in there, the water is now smelling very bad and a lot of stuff is dead at the bottom of the bucket but i still see some movement, do you think the curing will kill all of my hitchhikers? it already took the harlequins, if it takes the pistol and mantis too i would consider it fair trade but i think i saw the mantis moving arround last night and heard a couple of clicks this morning. there are tons of ways to do it but whould you think is better to use new water once i have the tank running to finish the curing or use at least part of the water in the bucket so i dont lose the ammonia thats still in there to accelerae the process? considering that water also must have other toxins in it from all this death i wonder what is better, maybe the same water and carbon once the cycle is finished?

[gone fishin]

It sounds like you have what I would call true live rock. IMO it could have gone into the Display tank straight away and would have been good to go no curing needed.

Try to keep some circulation in your bucket and I would do some frequent Water changes to try and minimize die off from your critters. Unfortunately I think only time will tell how much die off you end up with.

[sid101]

Yeah it is what i call wild live rock, i am a scuba diver and actually recognized the type of rock as (you guessed it) rock from my own reefs, sadly it was not taking straight to me seems like it sat inside a coleman container for a night in the guy's (actual mariculturer) pickup truck, but for what i see most of what has died in the bucked is from the rock i put in fresh water to flush the mantis, i wanted to setup the same day but the mdf stand failed me :(

[Sk8r]

Treat it as you would fish---you can put it in a bucket that's safe for fish, but keep water circulating and give it some light while you're waiting, even a strong light bulb will help, and keep the temperature and salinity proper.

[sid101]

quick update, 1:35am here, salinity in the tub is at 1.025, ph is 8.0 ammonia is at 5mg/l, just saw the mantis and the pistol in the bottom of the bucket dead, worms seems to be having a big feast altho some are dead too.

[Dkuhlmann]

That is a HUGE ammonia spike and what killed your fish. Too bad you couldn't have brought the rock home and put it directly into your tank. The delay on that is what has created this problem for you. So sad

[gone fishin]

quick update, 1:35am here, salinity in the tub is at 1.025, ph is 8.0 ammonia is at 5mg/l, just saw the mantis and the pistol in the bottom of the bucket dead, worms seems to be having a big feast altho some are dead too.

That is to bad. Once your new stand is ready maybe you can get another piece. Trying to think on the bright side, at least you will be rid of that MDF stand.

[sid101]

Yeah its a shame but well no mantis at least, I still see a lot of movement in the rock i just hope at least a couple of the nice crabs survived but honestly i doubt it altho i cleaned the bottom of the bucket today and only found bad dead stuff, no harlequins, no mithrax and no porcelains down there, the dead green mantis in the other hand was HUGE about 11 cm at least, got an estimate today for the stand and it was too high, expecting another one tomorow.