Live Rock Question

[Braves Fan]

When I got into this hobby a year ago, I knew nothing, and don't know much more than that now,lol. Anyway, My first big purchase after the tank was the Live Rock which I bought on line as my LFS was having a hard time getting live rock at that time. When I bought the LR, I was looking at all these web sites and they showed all these rocks with the nice colors on them, red, blue, green, yellows and I thought how nice these colors will look in a tank. Now a year later my rocks are all covered with the (sp) coralein algae on them. My question: What happened to all the nice looking colors that were on the rocks? If I would have known what I know now, I would have just bought base rock and a few seed pieces and saved a ton of money.

 

[fatcasey]

well, sometimes they will take pictures of the rock right out of the box from a shipment. You know how when you let coralein dry, it brightens up, thats essentially whats happening through the shipping. It is also sponges, algeas, and any other misc. sea creature that were on the rock when they hauled it up and just got put in the box too, usually die in shipping. I used to work at a shop and would have to clean the boxes of rock when they first came in.

 

[NotTheFace]

From what I have read: For legal reasons they have to blast of almost all of the stuff on the outer surface of the liverock before shipping out of the country. So if the sponges/algaes aren't inside the rock they don't come back. Purple coraline algae tends to out compete the other colors of coraline, I used to have teal coraline and the purple over took it. I still have a couple splotches of dark red coraline growing though.

 

[commonstranger]

Both of these answers are right.

 

[Wy Renegade]

Also has to do with lights - often the green coralline is the first to show, but under the intense lights of the aquarium, it fades out and is replaced by the purple/pink. Some of the other colors show up occassionally, but lighting prevents a lot of them from showing. Take some rock out sometime, turn it upside down or around to an area that light doesn't fully shine on. You'll be amazed at all the different shades of coralline that are actually present, but unseen.

 

[rock_lobster]

Yes it is just competitions and lighting the ocean supports all the coralines with less competion and a broader spectrum. Each aquarium will support a different type of coraline depending on what you have. From my experience purples/pinks come with intense metal halide and you get greenish shades with lower lighting. Also the elements in your water will play a role some do better with higher/lower calcium levels. Basically your rock will never look like that found in the ocean.

 

[Braves Fan]

Thanks for the replys, I was wondering why the rocks had lost all of the colors. I do have a bit of reds and yellows on the rock, just not much.