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04/12/2010, 12:35 AM | #1251 |
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some good looking rock :] if ya have any left over could ya send it my way? cant wait to see the system going. you know how much longer? also what are you doing for lighting? what kinda corals are your favorites?
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04/12/2010, 06:47 AM | #1252 |
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04/12/2010, 02:06 PM | #1253 |
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Live Rock --- Water change
I think I am ready for a complete water change for the live rock. I have two 400 Gal bins that has the 2200 lbs of live rock in temp storage. temp is currently 66 F in one and 70f in the other. saline is 1.025. new salt water is 70F and I am hoping to get 1.0245 salt. I will be doing a 100% complete water change to both vats. I will be inspecting each piece by hand and shaking the rock to see what falls off. I have got rubber gloves. The rock has been in the same water for ten days and still does not smell. The colour is great (I think). I have a soft brush but I'm not sure if I should use it. I will have a skimmer on each vat, 5 air hoses blowing bubbles in each vat and heaters.
Problems that I have due to inexperience on my part are.......... I won't know a pest or parasite on sight............... Should I dip in fresh water or concentrated salt water(1.03) if at all........ or should I wait? How much light does the rock require for the next two weeks? I would ask that if there is advice on what I should do that you indicate if its speculation or actual experience you are offering..........I am relying on the advice in this thread for guidence so I want folks to understand that its important to get it right................. I have to go back and get Mr Wilsons live rock list if I can find it...... Peter |
04/12/2010, 02:58 PM | #1254 |
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Peter,
That live rock looks great! Personally i have always cycled my live rock in teh dark for a few weeks, I had some extra time so i left some of it in the dark for probably 3 or 4 weeks. Always Maintaining Salinity and temp with Good Flow. This will keep the good bacteria alive and will prevent bad algae from starting. I have also read it helps cut down the cycle time but i haven't built enough systems to prove that out. HTH Rob Btw where did you get the miracle mud? Is there a local supplier that carries it? I don't recall ever seeing in any of the LFS |
04/12/2010, 03:22 PM | #1255 | |
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04/12/2010, 03:24 PM | #1256 |
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That would be great thanks!
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04/12/2010, 04:26 PM | #1257 | |
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TOOLS Rubber gloves Tweezers Narrow screw driver A coupe of schooners PROCEDURE Remove each rock one by one and shake them in a tub of water. This will remove the loose detritus. Treat all crabs as parasites, as very very few are friendly (commensal/symbiotic). Most of the worms you will encounter are harmless, but there will be no shortage of worms in the long run, so go ahead and remove any loose ones that may be injured. If they are healthy, they will be deep in the rock. Throw any snails you see into a bucket of saltwater and use your new macro lens to get some free identification on here. Watch for mantis shrimp (google it). They are easy to identify once you know what you are looking for. Yes, kill them. I would use the established saltwater the rock is in now for the rinsing process. Freshwater rinsing is more for corals that may have parasitic hitchhikers. Live rock is less likely to carry bad guys than live corals are. In the case of live corals, freshwater dips and a bath in an oxidizer such as Lugols iodine or potassium permanganate. The water at the bottom of your vats will be turbid/dirty, so make sure you set aside cleaner rinsing water as you work through the vats. Any sponges, sea squirts, or other invertebrates that have made it this far are hardy and should be left alone. Only new rock should have the sponges and algae removed from it. It is a good idea to reverse the stacking order of the rock as you put it in a new container, so the rock that was at the bottom is now at the top. Siphon or shopvac the junk off of the bottom of the vats. Remember to elevate the rock on milk crates to provide a buffer zone for crabs, worms and other questionable hitchhikers. After the rock has been acclimated for two weeks and you have not experienced a significant die-off, you can proceed to introduce a 6 hour photoperiod with somewhat diffused light. If your lighting is greater than 250 watt MHL, then suspend it two feet above the rock. Otherwise, a 250 watt MHL a foot above the water surface should be fine with a 6 hour photoperiod (day). Slowly move the photoperiod up to 8 hours per day over the next two weeks. Watch for diatom algae (brown slime). It will come and go in about two weeks, then you will get green slime algae (cyanobacteria). This too will pass in another month, give or take. Stare monitoring calcium, magnesium, and carbonate hardness levels. Maintaining these at optimum levels will foster the growth of coraline algae. It's also a good idea to start sorting rock sizes and shapes so you can have a better handle on your building blocks when you commence with the aquascaping. You don't want to get down to the bottom of the last vat and find those show size rocks you ordered. * The above information is based on my experience; however, my belief that you will follow these guidelines is based solely on speculation |
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04/12/2010, 05:01 PM | #1258 |
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your live rock temp should be closer to 80 degrees. lots of critters will/have die/d off from the low temp, and the rock will take a lot longer to cure. look up Q10 effect. the rate of chemical reactions doubles with every ten degrees C increase.
see the temperature info at http://www.ronshimek.com/salinity_temperature.html Crl |
04/12/2010, 05:55 PM | #1259 | |
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04/12/2010, 06:29 PM | #1260 | |
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All I'll add is don't be too stand off ish when handling it. Plunge it up and down, and give a good twist in the water. You'll be amazed how much comes out. Especially from the rock at the bottom. Spear/lever ALL crabs. Show no mercy. |
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04/12/2010, 06:45 PM | #1261 | |
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After following your thread over the past few weeks, I have come to two conclusions: 1) I believe you will be successful in reaching your vision with this project because of your willingness to view challenges with an open mind. Congrats on a great start! 2) This is the wrong forum to bring this up, but I will say it anyway...your pledge of no golf before there is salt water in the tank is a little extreme. |
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04/12/2010, 06:48 PM | #1262 | |
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04/12/2010, 07:00 PM | #1263 | |
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This is great Shawn, thank you. I will take pics........... Peter |
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04/12/2010, 07:17 PM | #1264 | |
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When you say "longer rubber gloves" does that mean you got the large animal veterinarian/Customs officer ones instead of the standard issue opera-length Aquaman gloves |
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04/12/2010, 07:46 PM | #1265 | |
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sorry I couldn't resist, my youth is what makes me this way. Looking good so far Peter, and yes the annoying runs to the hardware store suck. Just one question for the pros i.e. Mr. wilson. Peter is obvioulsy cooking his rock right now. You have suggested after cooking to rinse the hell out of the rock, then he may start adding to tank. Now I believe like 100 pages ago you said to always stack your rock without water. It makes its easier to stack and move etc, which makes sense. Now doing all that, will the rock have more die off from lets say spending a hour or so stacking the rock? would it be enough to create him to have a spike in his nitrogen cycle? I have always had a hard time understanding this. I know all the beneficial bacteria grows on the rocks which acts as your biological filter as would bioballs/sponge etc in FW. Now how long out of the water can your "biological filter" survive without recreating a cooking process? Thanks
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04/12/2010, 08:23 PM | #1266 | |
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By the time live rock makes it through the epic journey from the sea to its final resting place in the end users display tank, the sponges and other air sensitive critters have long perished. It takes about 6 hours to aquascape a 200-300 gallon tank, so a tank of this size can take days. You really don't want to rush the process and you definitely aren't in peak creative or technical mode after being up al night. I would recommend that Peter does the rock work one island at a time. It will take a day to do each island/rock feature. The rock can be pre-assembled in stages and eventually added to the tank where in can be covered with wet towels or newspapers if it has to sit for a few days. If the rock work is choreographed properly, the four pre-fab rock features can be placed in the tank on the same day. The other option is to put 4-6" of water in the bottom of the tank and use some powerheads with spray bars to turn the rock formations into waterfalls to keep them wet. The curing process Peter is currently doing will assure that the rock will be conditioned for the stress of bonding and partial drying. If you go with the wet towels or newspapers, take them off a couple times a day to let the rock "breath". From a biological standpoint, the aerobic (oxygen-rich) conditions of wet rock is ideal. I believe it was tonyf who suggested curing/acclimating live rock with a spray system where the rock is out of the water throughout the process. I like this practice as well as a similar ebb & flow system whereby the rock vat fills and drains on a constant cycle. These methods not only add more oxygen for biological filtration (nitrification), they also get around any flow dynamic issues as there are no dead spots. The other benefit is some of the bad guys (crabs, mantis shrimp etc.) jump ship and can be picked off of the bottom. If Peter needs to leave the rock partially exposed to atmospheric air for a few days as he crafts his Mount Rushmore reef, there will be no significant die-off or nitrogen spike. If there are any rocks with sponges on them, they can be added after the water is ready to be added. Now I know why he went with four coral heads... Mount Rushmore Of course it's possible for the rock structures to be prefabbed and added to the tank while it has water in it, but you will need a crane if you do the math (2200 LBS / 4 structures = ~ 550 lbs each). Just washing all that sand is a days work. For large installations a small (electric or manual) cement mixer is handy for washing the sand. Just hook up a garden hose and start turning it until the effluent water is more or less clear. Preparing RO/DI source water and mixing salt is another story entirely. The juggling act will be quite a challenge. How many kiddie pools did you buy Peter? |
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04/12/2010, 08:39 PM | #1267 |
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04/12/2010, 08:44 PM | #1268 | |
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04/12/2010, 09:01 PM | #1269 |
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Peter,
One thing that Mr. Wilson pointed out was the use of gloves and that he once experienced blood poisoning. I know two local reefers in my area that had this and had to go to the hospital every eight hours to get a new bag of Iv that they had to carry around while they were at work. One of them is an engineer at honda. That must have been awkward. Anyways watch out for fireworms They are red and if they sting you, you will KNOW!! GREAT WORK i can't wait till you actually start the aquascaping. Im assuming you will use the thorite cement to bond your major structure together? Don't for get to pre-drill everything. lots of 1/4" holes Rob |
04/12/2010, 09:13 PM | #1270 |
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The live rock pictures you have posted look fine to me, the only difference I can see is it has quite a lot of dark color, but if you cannot smell anything this is the first sign of dying/decaying life on your rock. As far as water temp goes it is my opinion that 70 degrees is the lowest you should aim for. you are doing everything else to help it along, as long as there is some natural light over the rock all critters good and bad will survive. It is a good idea to rinse, shake and remove all crabs loose worms unless it is healthy looking. putting the rock 4-6 inches above the bottom of the storage container occasionally will allow critters to fall to the bottom of the container and you can then keep or discard them. Just remember that all critters on live rock are there as a balance in nature. I have seen mantis shrimps in reef tanks that are 1-2 inches and they are model citizens because everything has enough food.
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04/12/2010, 09:15 PM | #1271 | |
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sorry for stealing the thread just needed to know. I'm sure everyone else is just drooling at the pics and not even reading my jibber jabber.
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04/12/2010, 09:26 PM | #1272 | ||
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Thanks, Peter |
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04/12/2010, 09:41 PM | #1273 | |
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04/12/2010, 09:44 PM | #1274 |
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Peter,
I don't think Shawn was suggesting a ban on chillers, however the prophylactic practice of using the chillers to chill the water down to 24-25 degrees when it can run comfortably at 28 degrees. (I can't get my head around Fahrenheit, sorry, temps in Centigrade). Obviously chillers need to be utilised to avoid catastrophe, however, people get too hung up on exact numbers. On Arlington reef on the GBR (where we do a lot of collecting) water temps swing from 29-30 degrees in summer to 22-23 in winter. Surface temps of 32 are not uncommon either. Ever been diving and started sweating? Welcome to my world. We need to cool off after 3 hours chasing fish! EDIT: Diid some conversions for you: 22 C =71.6 F 23 C =73.4 F 24 C =75.2 F 25 C =77.0 F 26 C =78.8 F 27 C =80.6 F 28 C =82.4 F 29 C =84.2 F 30 C =86.0 F 31 C =87.8 F 32 C =89.6 F FWIW I always have run my tanks around the 81-82 F mark Last edited by massman; 04/12/2010 at 09:55 PM. |
04/12/2010, 09:44 PM | #1275 | |
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