Restarted a tank. Am I missing a step?

[ramenorwhatever]

I had to reset my tank three weeks ago because I had briopsys, aiptasia, and dinoflagellates infestation from the rocks and corals I bought from the display tank of a fish store that was going out of business.

I took out all my corals, 2 clownfish, and CUC and moved them in a 20g quarantine/hospital tank with heater, HOB filter, powerhead, pond matrix from my display tank, turbo starter and I added a UV sterilizer a week after. So far, all my livestock are doing fine and the dino and briopsys are gone after two weeks.

My display tank is filled with tap water and I'm intermittently cleaning it because I'm not in a rush right now and my wife and I both agreed we rather look at a clean empty tank rather than dino and briopsys infested tank.

I scrubbed every rock and soaked them in peroxide and tap water for two days, I washed it again and soaked in tap water for another two days (it smelled like rotten eggs). I rinsed the rocks one last time and I placed it in a bucketful of saltwater, heater, carbon, bottled bacteria, and a powerhead. I put the appropriate amount of ammonia and it's been cycling ever since. The Ammonia went from over 4.0 ppm to .5ppm and I detected over 5 ppm of nitrites today.

I came from the freshwater hobby and it was a big no-no to use bleach on anything. But I saw a BRS video and it was acceptable to bleach rocks to cure it. And because my Ammonia dropped fairly quickly in about two weeks, I'm scared that I didn't cure the rocks well enough and I might have another briopsys and dinoflagellates outbreak. Should I restart the curing process of the rocks and soak them with bleach this time?

And after that's all said and done, should I put the second dose of ammonia in the bucket or will it be safe to move the rocks from the bucket to the display tank and dose the second round of ammonia in the display tank? And how much time can i leave the rocks out of the water?

thanks!

 

[nautical_nathaniel]

I think what you did will work just as good as bleach.

FWIW, if the bryopsis does come back you can usually kill it all off using fluconazole. Dino's are another beast to deal with, but proper water management and diligent removal when present (siphoning out the mats and doing small water changes every other day or so in addition to changing nutrient input practices) can usually beat it into submission. Dino's usually take over when folks just stare at their tank and expect them to go away.

Take a close look at your rocks, and if you see anything that causes you to worry, go ahead and go through the cleaning process with them again.

 

[IslandLifeReef]

I agree with @nautical_nathaniel, bleaching probably isn't necessary after what you did. I would cure the rock again since it sat in tap water for a while. The rock could have absorbed anything that was in the tap water. IMO, I would keep it in buckets of RO/DI saltwater for 30 days, changing the water once a week to help remove whatever leaches out of the rock.