cycle a single rock?

[Jon Fishman]

Going to be re-using all my old rocks from my current tank when I set up my new one. I needed more rock, so I just bought one locally, dry.

Can I place it in a rubbermaid with old tank water, a bunch of my sand from my existing tank (new tank will be bare-bottom so it is getting tossed eventually) and throw a powerhead in and get the rock “safe” for the new tank n a week or so? Should I put a bottle of that Dr Tim’s or Prime or whatever it is in there?

The move to the new tank will be stressful enough, I don’t want to have much (any) die-off and don’t want to make it worse with a new rock.

I can only guesstimate about 90-100lbs of rock in my existing tank, and I am adding one new dry rock, 64lbs

 

[LiveWire]

I would say for one single rock I would put it in a tub with fresh saltwater and a bunch of Nitrifying Bacteria be it Dr Times one and only, FritzZyme or Bio-Spira and let it go for the two weeks. I have done this in the past and never had an issue when I had to add rock to my system. Although I gave it a bit more time I think you will be fine. But did you say the one rock weighs 64 lbs? Or am I reading that wrong...

 

[Jon Fishman]

I would say for one single rock I would put it in a tub with fresh saltwater and a bunch of Nitrifying Bacteria be it Dr Times one and only, FritzZyme or Bio-Spira and let it go for the two weeks. I have done this in the past and never had an issue when I had to add rock to my system. Although I gave it a bit more time I think you will be fine. But did you say the one rock weighs 64 lbs? Or am I reading that wrong...

Yeah. 64lbs

 

[Hemmdog]

Do you have any smaller rocks in your display you could include with it for a cycle? You want to make sure it gets colonized with the same strains of bacteria as your tank rocks or it will cause blooms while they have warfare against each other.

 

[Jon Fishman]

Do you have any smaller rocks in your display you could include with it for a cycle? You want to make sure it gets colonized with the same strains of bacteria as your tank rocks or it will cause blooms while they have warfare against each other.

I probably have 20lbs in the sump..... but I can steal as much sand from my display as I want too.

I just don’t want to pull too much rock from current tank

 

[MabuyaQ]

You can't cycle rock in one week or a week or so.

Also take into account that the surface area sand provides to bacteria is much larger than that of any rock of similar total size/volume, so adding this rock might not even compensate the lost surface area when going barebottom even if you would get it cycled in time.

 

[Pntbll687]

Throw in a smaller rock from your sump it display, and add in some bacteria in a bottle.

It may be cycled in time but won't look the same as the other rock

 

[Jon Fishman]

I don’t have the new tank yet, so I am throwing a bunch in a rubbermaid tote. I will start it all now

 

[Jon Fishman]

I put probably 35lbs of rock in with it, 2 powerheads, 5lbs of sand (harder to get out without disturbing the tank than I thought) and even put in a large zoa-covered rock that I plan to sump in the new build. Should I still add bottled bacteria or would it be a competing source?? displaced 5 gallons of water or so, so I got a mini-water-change out of it.