Can coral pests survive without coral on new live rock?

[Flatlandreefer]

In weighing the pros and cons of live and dead rock I have been thinking about how legitimate fears that live rock will come with a bunch of pests actually are. I have used dry rock in the past and have experienced the difficulties that come with using 100% dry rock.

I know that there might be certain algae types on live rock, as well as the possible mantis shrimp in a shipment of fresh rock. My question is can pests such as Acro Eating Flat Worms, Zoanthid Eating Nudis, Red Bugs etc survive without their food source in an aquarium or curing bucket that doesn't have any corals?

 

[nautical_nathaniel]

In weighing the pros and cons of live and dead rock I have been thinking about how legitimate fears that live rock will come with a bunch of pests actually are. I have used dry rock in the past and have experienced the difficulties that come with using 100% dry rock.

I know that there might be certain algae types on live rock, as well as the possible mantis shrimp in a shipment of fresh rock. My question is can pests such as Acro Eating Flat Worms, Zoanthid Eating Nudis, Red Bugs etc survive without their food source in an aquarium or curing bucket that doesn't have any corals?

I've heard stories of these types of critters possibly coming in on liverock, but not as often as you would think. I think if you leave it in a bucket circulating with a pump or in the tank cycling for a few weeks it should help lessen the risk of these critters popping up. I would also heavily inspect the rocks before adding them to the tank to see what sort of critters may be on them.

 

[erky]

In weighing the pros and cons of live and dead rock I have been thinking about how legitimate fears that live rock will come with a bunch of pests actually are. I have used dry rock in the past and have experienced the difficulties that come with using 100% dry rock.

I know that there might be certain algae types on live rock, as well as the possible mantis shrimp in a shipment of fresh rock. My question is can pests such as Acro Eating Flat Worms, Zoanthid Eating Nudis, Red Bugs etc survive without their food source in an aquarium or curing bucket that doesn't have any corals?

AEFW do have a life cycle but without the Acros to eat they will starve, your best bet would be to QT this rock for a few weeks until they starve and break the life cycle. Now for a Mantis or other hitchhiker your best bet is to inspect the rock, then inspect again, and then finally inspect/inspect, you will have to be the controller of what goes into your tank. A short freshwater or acid bath would help in killing/removing of hitchhikers you do not want, but you also risk killing the useful bacteria you want on these rocks. There are always bacteria's in a bottle you can supplement after the baths.

 

[Skynyrd Fish]

Your going to cycle the tank and rock for at least a month. I'd go for it. Without the food source they will die. Most rock won't have coral parasites on it.

 

[Flatlandreefer]

I'm not actually getting ready to purchase live rock as my future upgrade is at least a year away. After reading post after post with people preaching "use dry rock, otherwise you are risking introduction of horrible pests into your system" I want to get some credible feedback how likely it is that pests will be introduced via live rock and if a simple fallow period of new live rock would mitigate most of these risks. It seems to me most of the anti live rock sentiment is fueled by generic "you will get pests" posts by members that may not really have that much first hand experience with live rock.

 

[erky]

i ordered 60lbs from the ocean on my first tank, what i can tell you is most of everything died off the rocks (sponges, crabs, who knows what else), the cycle that happened in my tank was very good. I didnt scrub any dead material off the rocks when i got them, and this caused some PO4/NO3 issues later down the road, but I did not have any pests or hitchhikers make it past the cycle. My ammonia was off the charts when i was testing during the cycle and i know this helped as well.

If you go fallow Id say you would be ok in the long run, coral pests need coral to eat to stay alive so if you disrupt their feeding they will all die, just make sure it is long enough for them to actually die.