It’s life not live
Bit of a rant here. Caribsea shouldn’t sell their painted dry rocks as ‘live rock’
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tharbin
2500 Club Member
While CaribSea came up with a catchy name, I have seen lots of posts that suggest newer hobbyists were confused by its name. I do feel that most of the 'rock' dealers in the hobby are hurting the consumer with their bizarre terminology. The example of the BRS listing for 'Dry Live Rock' is probably the worst of all. It is nothing but pure bxxxsxxx. There is not and can not be any such thing. Life Rock isn't even 'rock' it is a manufactured structure that utilizes ground up aragonite as its primary ingredient.
JaimeAdams
2500 Club Member
I'm amazed no one said this earlier
I had a buddy buy "real branch rock" off a guy. Calling me up asking what it's worth. I'm just like for actual real branch rock a ton. When I went to his house there were the totes of "Real Reef Branch Rock" I had to explain how they are basically ceramic and no internal pore structure for bacteria. He was pretty upset feeling that he had gotten scammed.
Another friend of mine went to the store and bought some "Real Reef Rock" telling me that he bought some live rock. I had to explain to him that no he bought a man made product. The employee called it "Real rock"
I use Life Rock and love it. Hasn’t fallen apart, lost color or chipped away. Have never had anything unwanted grow on it. I chose to start with dry rock to avoid unwanted hitchhikers. The company itself is a family business run by wonderful people (met and spoke in person multiple times and several occasions) that support educators and tanks in the classroom.
On a side note, I do keep a set of Maxspect Nano-Tech BioSpheres in the back of my tank (comes in handy when you instantly need a cycled qt or second tank) so I could care less how well the Life Rock holds bacteria. I love the shapes and the ease of which it has enabled me to construct a beautiful rockscape. I think this thread is a prime example of do your research and ask questions before doing anything in this hobby.
On a side note, I do keep a set of Maxspect Nano-Tech BioSpheres in the back of my tank (comes in handy when you instantly need a cycled qt or second tank) so I could care less how well the Life Rock holds bacteria. I love the shapes and the ease of which it has enabled me to construct a beautiful rockscape. I think this thread is a prime example of do your research and ask questions before doing anything in this hobby.
Koh23
Valuable Member
Every reefer i know personaly, reffers to live rock as type of rock, not state of rock.....
Live rock is calcium carbonate skeletons and deposits from long time dead corals, covered by all sort of organism and living thing. And only place it can be acquired is...well, natural reef.
Its super light, very porous. And yes, it can be dry aka death, with no life on or in it.
Man made rock from shells, mortar, ceramics, land excavated rock - they all can serve purpose, but they are not live rock.
Take a hammer and hit one rock, real rock will shatter in milion of pieces. All other types of rock can crack but remain solid.
Take real rock and throw it in muriatic acid. In matter of minutes rock will totaly dissolve, because its only deposits of calcium carbonate....
We have sea here, and there's two type of rock it can be obtained from it - basicaly land rock who somehow ended in sea floor, and over time become porous, but its only on surface. Inside, its hard piece of rock.
Other type is rock collected from depths, way too deep for normal hobyst to dive, and that rock is calcium carbonate deposits, extremly light, and porous. Problem is, because of depth and temperature, its impossible to keep anything live on or in it in "reef tank temperatures", and that makes it poor choice, if u even have someone to get it for you.
Its confusing, its all marketing, just look at weight,quantity and price, no matter if its wet or dry......
Live rock is calcium carbonate skeletons and deposits from long time dead corals, covered by all sort of organism and living thing. And only place it can be acquired is...well, natural reef.
Its super light, very porous. And yes, it can be dry aka death, with no life on or in it.
Man made rock from shells, mortar, ceramics, land excavated rock - they all can serve purpose, but they are not live rock.
Take a hammer and hit one rock, real rock will shatter in milion of pieces. All other types of rock can crack but remain solid.
Take real rock and throw it in muriatic acid. In matter of minutes rock will totaly dissolve, because its only deposits of calcium carbonate....
We have sea here, and there's two type of rock it can be obtained from it - basicaly land rock who somehow ended in sea floor, and over time become porous, but its only on surface. Inside, its hard piece of rock.
Other type is rock collected from depths, way too deep for normal hobyst to dive, and that rock is calcium carbonate deposits, extremly light, and porous. Problem is, because of depth and temperature, its impossible to keep anything live on or in it in "reef tank temperatures", and that makes it poor choice, if u even have someone to get it for you.
Its confusing, its all marketing, just look at weight,quantity and price, no matter if its wet or dry......
JaimeAdams
2500 Club Member
What you describe seems to be the new flavor in the hobby. Unique aquascapes using artificial substrate ie man made rock and then something along the lines of marinepure blocks in the sump for the bacteria.
Honestly, I remember seeing it listed under that category on BRS when I was just starting out and did think to myself, “this can’t be live rock, right?” Reading the description of the actual Life Rock on both BRS and Marine Depot at the time reaffirmed to me that they were just calling it that b/c of the supposed spores.
I was also window shopping online for a while before I made a purchase, so I had a lot of time to think before pulling the trigger. I wonder if folks eager to pull the trigger right away could be easier caught by that terminology.
This doesn’t make sense. You literally just said live rock is dead skeletons.
Live rock means it is wet and alive with bacteria and micro fauna. Real live rock to me would mean it came from an actual reef.
tharbin
2500 Club Member
There are probably some terminology differences by region. Here in the US, if you go back to the mid-80s we aquascaped with mainly four products: coral skeletons, live rock (shipped wet from various tropical areas), base rock (coral reef structure/rubble that was was dried and devoid of life and 'other stuff' (lava rock, cement or limestone structures, fiberglass sculptures, etc.). Today we still have these but the 'other stuff' has been refined to include aragonite-based sculptures that are 'painted' and possibly infused with some bacterial cysts; and quarried terrestrial ancient reef chunks.
The problem is not the products but the 'marketing' that surrounds them. I am not a fan of manufactured rock because while it may look like rock, its structure is more like a fancied-up garage floor.
That said, I have Life Rock in my tank and I knew what it was when I bought it. I would not have bought it though if I had seen it in person before the purchase. It is a step up from coral skeletons...
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Koh23
Valuable Member
Yes, maybe i said it wrong, but, calcium carbonate,dead skeletons of corals and other life that formed rock trough very long time - that is type of rock we want in our tanks.
But, hey, buy anything u want, call it any names.....its your tank
But, hey, buy anything u want, call it any names.....its your tank
BTW - bacteria is just one small part of the whole process and the easiest thing to add to the tank. Sponges, worms, all sizes of pods, hard algae, mini starfish, etc. all are products of real live rock that don't come sprayed onto concrete in dry form. Bacteria alone probably won't get anybody where they want to go.
BRS has been awful since the beginning with dry/dead rock. Of course, they are happy to sell you all kinds of products to battle it, too. Please... pretty please, just think of BRS as advertisements... infomercials. They are not out there to do totally objective things - their site, videos and marketing are there to sell their products.
BRS has been awful since the beginning with dry/dead rock. Of course, they are happy to sell you all kinds of products to battle it, too. Please... pretty please, just think of BRS as advertisements... infomercials. They are not out there to do totally objective things - their site, videos and marketing are there to sell their products.
Ocean live rock once was live coral. It is the remnants of coral skeletons that have dissolved, coated with coralline algae, dissolved again... and so on.
This is how reefs form. The corals die, new corals grow over them(sometimes the cause of death), over many many years you get a reef. The rock is dead skeletons.
It's happening in my tank right now as I have some encrusting corals that are encrusting over each other.
Rmckoy
7500 Club Member
To add to this …
Even dry white rocks will and do become live .
depends on the system for how long it will take to be able to process ammonia as efficiently as mature live rock
There is WAY more to live rock than just processing ammonia. Bio balls, bio bale, and all kinds of things can do that in short order. The benefit of real live rock goes to anoxic bacteria, homes for micro fauna, low phosphate so that the aragonite can buffer a bit of po4, and the ability to buffer. Dead dry rock really sucks at a lot of this for many years until the dead organics can be removed and the bound-up terrestrial po4 can be removed - until this happens, it is really hard for most inverts to call the rock home since local concentrations of po4 can be too high for them to thrive.
Not all dead/dry rock becomes truly live. It can, but usually at quite a cost and time.
Not all dead/dry rock becomes truly live. It can, but usually at quite a cost and time.
Theulli
Active Member
Agree here - I have a sump packed with filter media and life rock for the structure in the DT. I haven’t seen nitrates in my tank for months.
The one time I bought actual live rock I got an aiptasia outbreak for free with it.
ReefRxSWFL
Active Member
Dry rock of any kind, isnt, never was, and never will be live rock, because you cant get the bacterial diversity in a bottle that you get from the ocean.
bruno3047
Valuable Member
Unfortunately, you were sucked in by one of the biggest scams in the hobby. “Life rock“ is just a play on “live rock” and it’s sole purpose is to suck people into buying it, thinking that they’re actually getting something that is alive. And the claim that they coat the rock with nitrifying bacteria is provably a lie. The only type of bacteria that is able to become available in spores is anaerobic bacteria, the exact opposite of the bacteria needed to nitrify ammonia. Not much you can do about it, unless you want to go through the hassle of a small claims court filing, which you would surely win. Here’s a little ammunition if that’s the route you wish to take.
The Shocking Truth About Nitrifying Bacteria
Tired of conflicting information from one bacteria product to the next? So are we! Get informed.
acrylictankmanufacturing.com
Live rock is always wet because it has life that must be wet with saltwater to live
your first clue
If it wont drip on your shoe it isn't live rock
If you go to the store for jam and come home with Spam is it all a scam?
Or perhaps you don't actually know what you are looking for.
your first clue
If it wont drip on your shoe it isn't live rock
If you go to the store for jam and come home with Spam is it all a scam?
Or perhaps you don't actually know what you are looking for.
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