What to do next ?

[Freddy0144]

So... I recently tore down my 210 gallon reef after an awful crash during labor day weekend while I was away from the tank. while this was heart breaking as I lost all of my fish except for one it has a sunny side as we have decided to upgrade a bit to a 280 72x30x30 .

My old tank was problem ridden with cyano, and every algae one can think of... we tried multiple things to rid the tank of this problem and the rock was cooked for three months before I even put water in the tank.

So here is the scenario, I am cooking the rock again contained in a dark enclosure with new saltwater once per month nothing else. about 250 lbs. I have one fish from the old tank which I would like to keep (cleaner wrasse) it is nothing special but stood the test of all the problems. I also have a leather coral that has stood all the pain. I now have them set up in what use to be the fuge but converted to a tank to hold while we renovate.

when I start the new tank I really don't want any of the old problems so should I dry the rock for a month or two or just let it soak in the cooking process? I don't mind new tank syndrome, but this process seem to last for two years with the old tank.

Because of the lack the lack of rock one can get now I would like to re use the rock from my old aquarium, but I don't want the problems that I had.

looking for your advice.

Thanks in advance. I will be sure to post the build thread and progression of the tank when I get started with that part of our adventure. which is beginning to look like April or may at this point.

 

[ZoWhat]

White vinegar is pretty cheap at say a Samsclub and comes in 1gal jugs.

I would fill a 5g bucket half way up and methodologically SOAK LR pieces in straight up 5% acid vinegar for 3 days for each piece.

That will kill 99.9% of any nuisance material still embedded in the LR.

Cool thing about vinegar is its NONTOXIC to marine life in that if vinegar gets absorbed deep inside the rock.... if it starts leaching out in the sw tank water...the only thing it may do is keep your pH down around 7.8 until it's all leached out... it wont outright kill any fish or coral.

This vinegar soak is a total marine rock REBOOT.

Hth

 

[Greg P]

You're definately going to go through another tank cycle no matter what you do but by asking you're limiting your effects for sure.

If I were in your shoes, I'd put all the LR in tubs with heaters and powerheads and test the tubs weekly to start with.
I'd be testing for NH3 and PO4 only for the first weeks.
Then, I'd be testing/watching to see the Nitrate Cycle complete itself and, once that's completed, I'd be testing PO4 weekly.
Keeping the N03 bacteria alive is now acheived by adding liquid ammonia at very small doses, and weekly testing for PO4 is the key.
With water changes to remove any PO4, any LR can be fully 'cured' before adding it to a tank.

 

[Greg P]

During your weekly water changes of the LR, swish them very well in the old water and then transfer them to new water. The key here is to remove as much of the 'mulm' from the rock tubs as possible, and toss the old water, so be sure to wash the LR as well as possible between tank transfers.
I had rock in a tub that measured 100 NO3 and because I didn't rinse the rock well enough, it transferred much of the readings to the new water. Once rinsed more, it measured closer to the new water's readings of near zero.

Keep curing and water changing your rock weekly. Test it for PO4 and consider it done once a week has passed without any PO4 measurements.

Once you've been through all this, you can consider adding liquid ammonia to seed your LR and go through a Nitrate cycle in the tubs instead of the whole tank's system.
I prefer this as I don't need to remove 100+ Nitrate levels in my 100+ gallons of water, but rather in just the tubs.

I'm able to store over 30lbs of LR in just 15 gallons of water in a tub, so I was able to cycle my rock easily.