Best rock to use is new tank
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xWascallyWabbit
Active Member
I prefer using dry rock that was mined and cleaned from ancient reefs. For example marco rock.
The obvious pro is that it is pest free.
Con: Ugly stage is more obvious due to the white rock and itll take a few months to really settle in and start to mature.
Live wet rock skips alot of the cons noted above as the rock has been matured already. Obvious con: Pests
It's up to you on how patient you are and what your budget is.
The obvious pro is that it is pest free.
Con: Ugly stage is more obvious due to the white rock and itll take a few months to really settle in and start to mature.
Live wet rock skips alot of the cons noted above as the rock has been matured already. Obvious con: Pests
It's up to you on how patient you are and what your budget is.
Mr_Knightley
2500 Club Member
Wet live is what I would recommend. It has a natural balance of bacteria that no bottled product can compete with, and honestly looks a lot better. The only issue with live is that pests often hitchhike in on it, but most pests can be managed pretty easily. Another benefit of live rock is higher porosity, which means more surface area for bacteria to colonize. Try comparing a live rock & dry rock of the same size, the live will most likely be lighter after the water drains out.
Another method that can be used is a mix of both. You can get a few larger pieces of live, then fill in the rest with dry rock of your choice. Avoid CaribSea LifeRock, in my experience it seems to release junk into the water and is very easily colonized by pest algaes.
Spare time
10K Club member
Live rock is easier at the start, but more difficult in the long run. Dry Rock is the opposite. This is due to pests. You will get to the same end goal no matter what, it just depends on if you are willing to do a little extra work at the start or not (adding multiple bacteria mixtures ie heterotrophs, cycling ones, others, etc.). Snails, crabs, corals, etc. will all bring in that the bacteria and protests that are desirable on live rock.
I vote dry rock unless you can buy live rock guaranteed to be pest free. The top nuisances in the hobby are disease, pests, and algae. Algae has less competition at the start with dry rock, but overtime this changes. You can counter this with competitive bacteria early on.
After a year of dry rock, you won't be able to tell the difference in except you have no pests.
I vote dry rock unless you can buy live rock guaranteed to be pest free. The top nuisances in the hobby are disease, pests, and algae. Algae has less competition at the start with dry rock, but overtime this changes. You can counter this with competitive bacteria early on.
After a year of dry rock, you won't be able to tell the difference in except you have no pests.
xWascallyWabbit
Active Member
Valid points, there are several pros to live rock.
Usually it is much more expensive though. Depending on your budget and plans a mix is a good recommendation.
I just cant get myself to knowingly introduce unknown variables like pests and algaes to my tanks after spending thousands to set it up. For that reason I went dry. It will take longer to mature there's no doubt 2 years from now, no one would ever know the difference.
Mr_Knightley
2500 Club Member
Completely true. I like to have at least a little bit of live in the tank, my current tank is mostly dry with some live mixed in. It's run pretty well over the past two years.
reeftankdude
Well-Known Member
I asked myself the same question. At the end of my thoughts I decided on base white rock. Base white rock has no parasites and is very less in cost. I used API Quick Start and Turbo Start 900 and my tank cycled in two weeks. I highly recommend Turbo 900. The API bacteria brought me from 4ppm ammonia to zero in a week. However, my tank showed no nitrite nor nitrate. I added some more ammonia up to 2ppm and the API brought it down to .25 ppm and stalled at .25ppm. I used the Turbo start and in 5 days I was cycled with nitrite showing and disapearing leaving only nitrate and zero ammonia. I decided to buy a small piece of live calcified rock to get my carolline algae going. I dipped it which showed a parasite. The rock is half a pound. I cant imagine what 50 pounds of live rock would have in parasites. I used Seachem Dip.
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Midrats
Valuable Member
Real live rock only ever here. I did do dry rock once, never again. Live rock is just so much easier and more fun. It's my favorite part about setting up a new tank. The unwanted hitchhiker fearmongering is totally unwarranted. It's not like Rutger Hauer is going to pop out of your rock. Unwanted crustaceans maybe, but they are easy to pick out. Just avoid the rock bins at most LFSs and order it fresh.
polyppal
2500 Club Member
I have had both over the years, IMO these are pros/cons to either scape method:
Ocean-sourced liverock:
- Quickest path to tank maturity/stability and CCA/tank microbic diversity
- Looks great
Very expensive
Hard to source and ship
Hard to aquascape
Often comes with pests you will have to battle indefinately
Die-off on rock surface can cause nitrate spikes for a while
Dry/Manmade Rock:
- Much cheaper
- Readily available in store and online
- Easier to aquascape/modify
- No threat of anemones/worms/algaes/other pests from ocean
- Long path to tank maturity/stability/CCA/microbic diversity
- Ugly stage likely to be pronounced, and generally lasts several months to a year+
If your patient and not expecting the tank to look amazing for a solid 8-12mos, id go with dry rock. To me, the risk of introducing pests and the sky high cost of real live rock isn't worth it. Don't waste your money on the 'cultured' rock you see at the stores though, its usually just dry rock that's been soaking in a tank for a few weeks that they want to charge a lot more for. Unless its been in the tank for years and is covered in real CCA, its advantages on maturity/biodiversity are likely negligible.
Live rock! It doesn’t come with that many pests. Often when I see a tank overrun with pests it is something that came in on a frag and the dry rock they started with left a lot of area for the pest to quickly colonize.
I mean crap… Aiptasia doesn’t even grow in the KPA rock area and the gulf only has a relative that doesn’t spread as fast yet we see tons of threads about Aiptasia. Well it didn’t come from the commonly sourced live rock of today. sorry.
I mean crap… Aiptasia doesn’t even grow in the KPA rock area and the gulf only has a relative that doesn’t spread as fast yet we see tons of threads about Aiptasia. Well it didn’t come from the commonly sourced live rock of today. sorry.
JNalley
Valuable Member
I miss the good old days when there was proper live rock taken from reefs and put in our tank. That said, KP Aquatics, Tampa Bay Saltwater, and a few others do a really nice seeding process on the ocean floor, it just ain't no Walt Smith Fiji or Tonga. So if I had the money, I'd go that route. However, since I am a poor college student I tried a few different types of dry and manmade dry rocks on my daughter's tank, with some cured live rock from my LFS (Old walt smith stuff from tank teardowns that's now devoid of everything except the bacteria).
CaribSea "Life Rock" = terrible. It's super dense, and when you break it open, the cement inside is powdery and hasn't cured.
Marco Rocks = Ok, it's real rock, so that's a plus, but it's a little TOO white/cream colored for me and way too uniform in color
Cornerstone = Exceptional man-made rock with a solid center, and painted, as well as spored bacteria on the outside
CaribSea Moani = The best of both worlds, dry, real rock, with a few dots of color here and there, and spored bacteria. This rock is lovely, and it's what I chose for my new build.
CaribSea "Life Rock" = terrible. It's super dense, and when you break it open, the cement inside is powdery and hasn't cured.
Marco Rocks = Ok, it's real rock, so that's a plus, but it's a little TOO white/cream colored for me and way too uniform in color
Cornerstone = Exceptional man-made rock with a solid center, and painted, as well as spored bacteria on the outside
CaribSea Moani = The best of both worlds, dry, real rock, with a few dots of color here and there, and spored bacteria. This rock is lovely, and it's what I chose for my new build.
Willhersh34
Community Member
I started with some dry rock from Caribsea. Then ”cured” it as a precaution in RODI for a few days. Added to tank, started cycle, test, blah, blah, blah. There are certainly better options than Caribsea but was like $80 for 40 lbs, Amazon so no shipping. You get the idea. Next tank, same deal.
My vote is dry for the pest reasons mentioned. I don’t even trust the wet stuff from my LFS. I’m sure it’s fine but for piece of mind I want to know there are no hitch hikers.
Live rock all the way for me approx 180lbs 16 years in my tanks. From Walt smith back when it was more affordable it was 3.49 a pound if I remember correctly. Did have nitrate spikes for the first couple months. Not many pests when first received a couple crabs and some turf algae. Once out of the nitrate spikes though zero issues and no qt for me because of it.
Properly prepared quality live rock is the Cadillac of methods to establish a reef tank... if you can find it. BlueZoo Aquatics stocked good rock not so long ago for a decent price... like $350 delivered for 44 lbs.
https://www.livestockusa.org/ROCK.html says it has "Cultured Fiji Rock". I think it is manmade rock cultured in the Indian or Pacific oceans around Indonesia. Kind of looks like Fiji Rock in their pictures.
https://www.livestockusa.org/ROCK.html says it has "Cultured Fiji Rock". I think it is manmade rock cultured in the Indian or Pacific oceans around Indonesia. Kind of looks like Fiji Rock in their pictures.
alanh10
New Member
Hi thanks for your reply, what’s wrong with the rock bins like the one attached at my lfs?
damsels are not mean
Valuable Member
The best rock? Rock from a 10 year old reef tank that has not had any major pests. Established and all the lifeforms have already been selected for in a tank.
Live rock is great but not so easy to spend your time on with aquascaping, also it's expensive as hell and can carry pests.
If I were starting a tank today I'd use mostly dry rock which I can epoxy together and optimize the 'scape. Then I'd seed it with some quality live rock from KP and others and take my time (like months, not weeks) to let those seed rocks colonize the dry rock with the lights low or off. I'd cure some of the live rock with the prettiest coralline in a seperate, lit tank while this happens so that I can then move that cured rock into the main system and get that pretty coralline spreading.
Might sound crazy to wait so long to put anything in the tank, but if you are setting up a tank that you want to be working in 10 or 20 years that extra few months will be forgotten in the long run and you will skip the "uglies".
Live rock is great but not so easy to spend your time on with aquascaping, also it's expensive as hell and can carry pests.
If I were starting a tank today I'd use mostly dry rock which I can epoxy together and optimize the 'scape. Then I'd seed it with some quality live rock from KP and others and take my time (like months, not weeks) to let those seed rocks colonize the dry rock with the lights low or off. I'd cure some of the live rock with the prettiest coralline in a seperate, lit tank while this happens so that I can then move that cured rock into the main system and get that pretty coralline spreading.
Might sound crazy to wait so long to put anything in the tank, but if you are setting up a tank that you want to be working in 10 or 20 years that extra few months will be forgotten in the long run and you will skip the "uglies".
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