If the water was warm enough to swim out to the sea grass beds, I would say go for it.
Hi! I live on LI as well. I definitely wouldn’t add anything from LI to my tank. I feel like it’s a completely different environment than a reef tank plus, it’s freezing. You can buy a nice sized piece of live rock from one of the LFS. Also, different types of macro algae, different bottled bacteria, some used sand or filter media will all add the biodiversity you’re looking for.
I don't know in USA, but here in Italy live rocks come from various "tropical" areas (very different organisms mixed together) and sometime both the seawater or the rocks have Mediterranean organisms (mainly generalistic Worms and snails as well as copepodi species), suggesting a possible direct exchange with NSW or environment. In our case, taking some biodiversity from intertidal areas is not the end of our world IMHO.
Which was better in your opinion?
I’m really struggling with dinos randy. The sand bed looks horrible. Can you point me in the right direction with a resource that gives straightforward instructions? I’m pretty lost with all of the advice- as much of it is contradicting
I’m not sure if your talking about the Company gulf live rock (your probably not). Although I agree that you can get some very diverse rock from the gulf, but the rock I received from https://gulfliverock.com/ was the most dense and unnaturally shaped rock I’ve ever worked with. Not porous at all. So if anybody is looking for rock, avoid this company. They would not refund my money.
