cured vs. cooked live rock

[slyforestfire]

lil back story here. searching craigslist looking for material to aquascape. found a guy with a posting for "cooked" live rock. he said it had been in plastic bins for months covered with good flow. water changes were done regularily. i was a little confused cause that process, from my research, was called curing. done in order to clean off dead and dying organsims from transport, etc... when i brought this up i was rudely informed that they arent near the same process. his take on it is this, "Curing is basically just letting the rock become "live" where as cooking it allows the bacteria to eat all f the phosphates that are bound in the rock, this way you shouldn't have nuisance algae" am i completely clueless and been reading the wrong articles throughout my research? is this product he is offering at a significant discount worth it?

 

[slyforestfire]

maybe i should enter the article writing contest with an entry all about this learning process.... when i started this figured it wouldnt be much different than my fw setups, boy was i wrong. lol

 

[Jgomez324]

In my experience both cooked and none cooked rock went thur a cycle. It sounds like he was trying to cycle it if he had it In water and flow? I don't know how much if any bacteria is growing on it in a bucket of water with not fish or sand. But I'd buy it and let it run do water test and use it if the numbers are right.

 

[slyforestfire]

i think i understand a lil better now. read an article here. basically cooking is a cycle, yes, but not an algae cycle a bacterial one. leaving it in the dark starves out the corraline and gives the bacteria a chance to attack the phosphates in the rock.

 

[slyforestfire]

so if that is the case, sounds like the product discussed would be perfect for my base rock, and ill just have to seed the corraline with a piece of live rock from lfs or where ever.

 

[Jgomez324]

Yes but cooking is not a cycle it is a sterilizing process per say. Some boil so use acid and it kills everything. So I would get it add a little at a time with live rock and let it build the good bacteria and test for nitrate and ammonia.

 

[slyforestfire]

Yes but cooking is not a cycle it is a sterilizing process per say. Some boil so use acid and it kills everything. So I would get it add a little at a time with live rock and let it build the good bacteria and test for nitrate and ammonia.

thank you jgomez for your advice. for the price i cant pass up this rock. will have to make sure the seller is more specific bout their methods. he never mentioned any chemicals. just ro/di water and saltmix.

 

[Jgomez324]

If you have no coral or fish yet add it all and let it go thur the cycle but it you have fish just add a lite at a time unless you cycle it all before adding it. Good luck

 

[Rayzback]

Usually when you cook your rock, you keep it away from light and do lots of water changes. Really shake it off between water changes. The darkness is only supposed to allow the bacteria to thrive feeding of what's left in the rock that doesn't die... until its clean. Longer and more labor intensive process then cure. No reason to do it unless the rock is pretty messed up to start with, IMO.


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[slyforestfire]

Usually when you cook your rock, you keep it away from light and do lots of water changes. Really shake it off between water changes. The darkness is only supposed to allow the bacteria to thrive feeding of what's left in the rock that doesn't die... until its clean. Longer and more labor intensive process then cure. No reason to do it unless the rock is pretty messed up to start with, IMO.

whether or not it was needed the guy did, for 2 months he said. put all 60 lbs in my empty tank. its been a week and im getting a khaki- brown all over the rocks purple splothches here and there. so no chance of invert surviving? bummer. know i dont want any pest but was hoping for some good nudi, copes, etc....