Maintaining ONLY live rock long term

Solga · Dec 5, 2021

I have done some searching, and can not seem to find an answer for this. Maybe it's that I do not know how to phrase the questions either, but I am going to try to explain my thought process here.

While I have my "down times" during the day and wile I try to go to sleep, my mind goes about 1,000,000 miles an hour, but one thing that I keep circling back to is this:

What would it take to maintain JUST live rock. No fish, No Coral, just the live rock ?

Here is my reasoning for this question. We all start up, and shut down aquariums all of the time an one of the biggest hurdles that I see, is getting a "safe" live rock from somewhere. So let's imagine that I have an empty room (I wish) and in that empty room I had a massive fish pond type container with 500 pounds of dry rock in it. And lets just say that my end goal is to get this rock cycled and keep this rock "alive" for 1 year +, without introducing any coral or fish into the system. Algae would be of no concern. This way, if a friend or club member decides to start up a reef tank, I could give him some of the mature live rock to jump start his/her/their system.

Just something that I have thought of many times....

Anyone have any actual experience with this, or any ideas / theories ?

Clarkjw2002 · Dec 5, 2021

Not too hard.

When the bans on real rock started happening I bought up a bunch of Fiji rock as I really don't like the lack of porosity in the dried mined stuff. Have about 250 lbs in a livestock trough now (from Tractor Supply)--along with some flat cut base Marco rock. Did this mainly to allow any trapped phosphates to leach out. I just do water changes with old tank water which supplies enough nutrients to maintain some bacteria. All that is in it is some circulation pumps, a skimmer, and a GFO reactor.

If I really wanted it live I'd just feed a pinch of fish feed every other day or so but my main goal is to get rid of any phosphates. It will be dried again before aquascaping.

I also have a 40 breeder with KP live rock and a deep sand bed as my biodiversity seed tank. It has one court jester goby and frags from my main tank. I feed this like a normal tank. This will go into a 125 gal refugium which will be connected to the 315 gal display to colonize the dry rock once set up.

Solga · Dec 5, 2021

Thank you for the reply !
I have 3 covered brute cans full of used / cleaned dry rock just sitting in storage waiting to be used at some point in time. Biggest thing is, I only have a 40B right now, and there is no way I can use it all. Which is what originally got me thinking about just finding a container big enough for it all, and starting to cycle it all with something like Dr. Tims, Bio-spira, Fritz, and maybe a couple bottles of the coraline stuff, and then maybe throw a bag of sand in it for good measure.
That way, when it comes time to scape my tank, I can pick whatever pieces I need, and just use the rest to swap out with people trying to start up new tanks.

ColoredRock · Dec 5, 2021

Solga said:
I have 3 covered brute cans full of used / cleaned dry rock

Get water in there! Throw a cheap power head in each.... what is the ambient temperature in the area the brutes /rock is now?

Solga · Dec 5, 2021

ColoredRock said:
Get water in there! Throw a cheap power head in each.... what is the ambient temperature in the area the brutes /rock is now?

Well, I live in Indiana, so whatever the temperature is outside (currently sunny and 34*) is probably close to what the temps of the brutes are. They are in my storage unit about 1/2 mile from my house. Unfortunately, the storage unit is not climate controlled, and is pretty much a metal building that is sectioned into bays.

I do have an enclosed back porch area that is our laundry / catch all room, but even there, space is limited. I could probably only put 1 brute can back there for now, until I move some other hobby stuff out to the shed anyway.

Grumblez · Dec 5, 2021

If it's well matured live rock that's been in a tank for a long time it will have enough detritus probably trapped in it to maintain a healthy bacteria culture for a very long time. Really just need a tiny bit of flow I would say and ideally stored somewhere that doesn't get to close to freezing or 90+ degrees. Can honestly probably even be okay without flow but not sure on that.

ReefSlice · Dec 5, 2021

When I bought my TBS live rock, I had it in its own heated 20 gallon tank for over a year before using it in a tank build. I fed reef roids every few days and did a water change every 2 weeks, and all of the critters on the rock loved it. Some type of sponge food would be great also. By the time I used it, coralline coverage on the tank was great (lit by 2 cheap par38 bulbs and a HOB filter for flow) and everything I could have possibly kept alive long term including ball anemones, feather dusters, tiny pistol shrimp, macro algae and even an urchin that hatched out of the rock a few weeks in was thriving.

ColoredRock · Dec 5, 2021

Solga said:
a couple bottles of the coraline stuff

Coloredrocks.. haha.. are awesome... but they do come in time regardless.. but coraline is an algae and takes up nutrients that we want the coral to have.

If it were me.. I would spread out the rock form a structure and get it in water in the brute with a heater and circulation. Check salinity and phosphate every once in awhile. Then with the other rock do the same when you have the space.

Logical_Plan · Dec 5, 2021

While this is a cool idea. I think it is missing some key parts. My understanding is that the first part of live rock is the two nitrifying bacteria. What you get naturally or via Dr Tim's, turbo start, etc.

There are more layers of bacteria that culture on / in the rocks to make them more biodiverse. These cultures come in on fish, corals, inverts, etc.

So to have useful live rock, that skip cycles and minimizes the uglies, you need this other biodiversity.

I also believe that these other cultures need other food sources, carbon, alkalinity, etc.

I have had similar thoughts to you, but I think it is more complicated first to create biodiverse live rock. Then to propagate it without an ocean or marine life to keep it safe.

There is a marine biodiversity test you can do for your tank, but I can't find it right now. Saw it on a brs video.

Solga · Dec 5, 2021

Grumblez said:
If it's well matured live rock that's been in a tank for a long time it will have enough detritus probably trapped in it to maintain a healthy bacteria culture for a very long time. Really just need a tiny bit of flow I would say and ideally stored somewhere that doesn't get to close to freezing or 90+ degrees. Can honestly probably even be okay without flow but not sure on that.

Grumblez, The rock 'was' well matured live rock, and at the end of it being in the tank it was all pretty neglected. Then when I acquired it, I gave it all a vinegar/RODI bath and rinse, then left it in the summer sun for 2 weeks to dry out, before placing it all into 39 gallon brute cans with lids, and placing into storage about 5ish years ago. So I would say that anything that made it through the vinegar / RODI is probably long gone, but I have been wrong before.
On a side note, some of this "rock" did not bubble up or have any kind of reaction at all when I placed it in the vinegar bath ... so no calcium maybe ? It was in a tank for over 5+ years, so I assume that it was not too bad of a type of rock ....

Thank you for the reply and the information !

ReefSlice said:
When I bought my TBS live rock, I had it in its own heated 20 gallon tank for over a year before using it in a tank build. I fed reef roids every few days and did a water change every 2 weeks, and all of the critters on the rock loved it. Some type of sponge food would be great also. By the time I used it, coralline coverage on the tank was great (lit by 2 cheap par38 bulbs and a HOB filter for flow) and everything I could have possibly kept alive long term including ball anemones, feather dusters, tiny pistol shrimp, macro algae and even an urchin that hatched out of the rock a few weeks in was thriving.

Reefslice, Thank you very much for the info provided !! Although the rock I have is not, and has not been, alive for quite some time, this gives me some hope for heeping it going ! Looks like I will probably just bring one of the brute cans here to the house, throw a heater and a cheap power head in there to get things moving, until I can finish getting my 40B set up and wet.

Solga · Dec 5, 2021

ColoredRock said:
Coloredrocks.. haha.. are awesome... but they do come in time regardless.. but coraline is an algae and takes up nutrients that we want the coral to have.

If it were me.. I would spread out the rock form a structure and get it in water in the brute with a heater and circulation. Check salinity and phosphate every once in awhile. Then with the other rock do the same when you have the space.

Duly noted ! I will need to get out my test kits and check the expiration on them. If they are not expired yet, I will be surprised. So new testers will probably be next on my "to order" list. Thans again !!

Logical_Plan said:
While this is a cool idea. I think it is missing some key parts. My understanding is that the first part of live rock is the two nitrifying bacteria. What you get naturally or via Dr Tim's, turbo start, etc.

There are more layers of bacteria that culture on / in the rocks to make them more biodiverse. These cultures come in on fish, corals, inverts, etc.

So to have useful live rock, that skip cycles and minimizes the uglies, you need this other biodiversity.

I also believe that these other cultures need other food sources, carbon, alkalinity, etc.

I have had similar thoughts to you, but I think it is more complicated first to create biodiverse live rock. Then to propagate it without an ocean or marine life to keep it safe.

There is a marine biodiversity test you can do for your tank, but I can't find it right now. Saw it on a brs video.

Logical plan, I guess that I never really considered this part of the equation. It does make me wonder how the LFS's keep systems similar to what I am describing. Or was it even really "live" rock that they were selling ? The ones that I seen in the past, did not seem to have any plumbing to other tanks, and didn't have any fish (that I could see) in the big vats of water with rock in it. I will look as well, but if you happen across that marine biodiversity test, please do share !

Logical_Plan · Dec 5, 2021

Solga said:
Duly noted ! I will need to get out my test kits and check the expiration on them. If they are not expired yet, I will be surprised. So new testers will probably be next on my "to order" list. Thans again !!

Logical plan, I guess that I never really considered this part of the equation. It does make me wonder how the LFS's keep systems similar to what I am describing. Or was it even really "live" rock that they were selling ? The ones that I seen in the past, did not seem to have any plumbing to other tanks, and didn't have any fish (that I could see) in the big vats of water with rock in it. I will look as well, but if you happen across that marine biodiversity test, please do share !