Moving/Upgrade Plan, Good or Waste of Time?

[AKay3600]

So I will be moving out of an apartment and into a house soon and will be able to upgrade my 29 to something a bit bigger. My tank is 6 years old and rather infested with vermetid snails and micro brittle stars. I know they aren't the end of the world but I am pretty sick of them. As I am still trying to decide what tank to upgrade to and where it will work best in the new house I was thinking that I could take the time to cook my rocks. My plan is to frag and sell off a decent amount of my corals to help pay for the upgrade. I will then put the remaining corals and fish into a temporary tank while I put the majority of the rocks into a tote and black it out with a pump and maybe a skimmer. My hope is that I can starve out a majority of the pests I don't want while still keeping the rock.

How long do you think I would need to cook the rocks to accomplish my goal? Would one month be good or would I need to do two, which may be the case depending on when the tank I pick will arrive. Does this plan seem like it would work to get my rocks and tank back to a basically fresh start? Or is just going to be a waste of time in the end.

Thanks!

 

[brandon429]

blackouts wont kill verms and brittle ophiuroid stars need to adjust that part.

those will come back as soon as you add more frags, can't beat em I'll bet.

what you do is have corals growing so strongly they overcome the verms. For example this sps has killed one lol by overgrowing its entire tube and sealing up the end:

the verm is encased in a tomb of yellow montipora. he's like let me out, let me out. just this week it encased, this is like being swallowed up by a turtle or a sloth while running away from them lol.

 

[MnFish1]

So I will be moving out of an apartment and into a house soon and will be able to upgrade my 29 to something a bit bigger. My tank is 6 years old and rather infested with vermetid snails and micro brittle stars. I know they aren't the end of the world but I am pretty sick of them. As I am still trying to decide what tank to upgrade to and where it will work best in the new house I was thinking that I could take the time to cook my rocks. My plan is to frag and sell off a decent amount of my corals to help pay for the upgrade. I will then put the remaining corals and fish into a temporary tank while I put the majority of the rocks into a tote and black it out with a pump and maybe a skimmer. My hope is that I can starve out a majority of the pests I don't want while still keeping the rock.

How long do you think I would need to cook the rocks to accomplish my goal? Would one month be good or would I need to do two, which may be the case depending on when the tank I pick will arrive. Does this plan seem like it would work to get my rocks and tank back to a basically fresh start? Or is just going to be a waste of time in the end.

Thanks!

I am not sure this will work. In other words it 'could - and likely would' be a waste of time. Maybe a different approach would be to take the rocks out, scrub them, and if you want to use a chemical (bleach, peroxide, etc) to kill things that would also work. Of course - you then basically have 'dead rock'. And will have to start over.

I tried a similar method (the dark tub), and it did not work to 'kill everything', it merely let the 'dead things' on the rock decompose - so there won't be an ammonia spike. Additionally, many of these things are very very hardy. I had a leather coral - it grew (way out grew) the tank - and I thought it was leaching toxins into the water. I removed it, took out the rock, scrubbed the base - put the rock back in - and 3 years later - it grew back on the exact spot, on teh same rock.

 

[AKay3600]

blackouts wont kill verms and brittle ophiuroid stars need to adjust that part.

those will come back as soon as you add more frags, can't beat em I'll bet.

what you do is have corals growing so strongly they overcome the verms. For example this sps has killed one lol by overgrowing its entire tube and sealing up the end:

Well I know the blackout won't kill them but I was hoping that I could maybe starve them by cutting off their food supply since I wouldn't be feeding the tote for awhile. Yeah I figure they will eventually return but would like to get their numbers in check a bit more. In my tank they seem to just grow right through the SPS and are everywhere inside my candy cane coral and my euphyllias which can't be making them happy.

I am not sure this will work. In other words it 'could - and likely would' be a waste of time. Maybe a different approach would be to take the rocks out, scrub them, and if you want to use a chemical (bleach, peroxide, etc) to kill things that would also work. Of course - you then basically have 'dead rock'. And will have to start over.

I tried a similar method (the dark tub), and it did not work to 'kill everything', it merely let the 'dead things' on the rock decompose - so there won't be an ammonia spike. Additionally, many of these things are very very hardy. I had a leather coral - it grew (way out grew) the tank - and I thought it was leaching toxins into the water. I removed it, took out the rock, scrubbed the base - put the rock back in - and 3 years later - it grew back on the exact spot, on teh same rock.

Hmm yeah I guess I would give them a good shake and scrub before putting them in the tote, could then periodically scrub them again every week or so. I'd rather not use chemicals and kill off the rock completely if I can avoid it. I think I would rather try the tedious approach of scrubbing them every week or so just to try and keep all the good bacteria alive.

Ha yeah I've noticed that with leathers I've removed, no matter how well I think I get it off, it always comes back at least a little bit.

From your two responses though I guess I may have to lower my expectations on how well this will work. I think I'll still cook the rock for a bit of time and will just have to make sure I keep scrubbing and checking for them before adding the rocks back into the new tank. Will keep thinking about going the chemical warfare route though and may just decide to start it all over again...hmmm

Thanks for the responses!

 

[brandon429]

You won’t be able to shake them at all.

not being a downer just relaying what we see in work thread trends. My reco is do opposite of the current plan for live rock, boost up its residents, not stress them because that stress won’t meet your outcome plan we watch folks try and shake the verms all the time just going off patterns. The verms win

 

[AKay3600]

You won’t be able to shake them at all.

not being a downer just relaying what we see in work thread trends. My reco is do opposite of the current plan for live rock, boost up its residents, not stress them because that stress won’t meet your outcome plan we watch folks try and shake the verms all the time just going off patterns. The verms win

Yeah I suppose hmm and I know you're not trying to be a downer, I also just don't want to admit you're right haha

Either way I think I'll be stressing the rocks as I'll be moving them and removing some corals to frag and sell. I guess after that I'll just see what I can do to cover all the rock with coral and I'll see if I can do better at keeping the corals at least free of most of them. My large frogspawn and candy cane are just filled with them sadly. Can't see them during the day but when the lights are off and corals aren't open, then you see how bad it really is.

Thanks for the responses though, you've got me pretty close to convinced that there is no point in "cooking" the rock and that I might as well just scrape the rock as best as I can and get the new tank up and running.

 

[MnFish1]

Yeah I suppose hmm and I know you're not trying to be a downer, I also just don't want to admit you're right haha

Either way I think I'll be stressing the rocks as I'll be moving them and removing some corals to frag and sell. I guess after that I'll just see what I can do to cover all the rock with coral and I'll see if I can do better at keeping the corals at least free of most of them. My large frogspawn and candy cane are just filled with them sadly. Can't see them during the day but when the lights are off and corals aren't open, then you see how bad it really is.

Thanks for the responses though, you've got me pretty close to convinced that there is no point in "cooking" the rock and that I might as well just scrape the rock as best as I can and get the new tank up and running.

Well - the one thing is - if they are already so imbedded into your coral - they will likely come right back in your new tank - no matter what you do with the rock?

I did a little research - and I have these (rare) in my tank - and not on any coral (but I pierced my arm with one grabbing under a large rock. One thing is 'clearer water' - no coral feeding. Just feed the fish. Keep the tank cleaner - and they will starve. FWIW - I have never fed corals (except what little pieces they might get from the fish food). But its something to try. Another thing - try to remove detritus. And lastly - coral snow - which can clear the water - has been shown to SLOWLY help. Hope this helps

 

[AKay3600]

Well I do plan on removing all the corals and fragging them and cleaning them up. So ideally I would be able to clear the corals at least of them, but I guess yeah no guarantee I get them all.

Yeah I have stopped feeding my corals and don't feed much as I only have the 3 fish. So maybe if I do isolate the rock and add no extra food and try the marine snow I can at least put a nice dent in their numbers in combination with manual removal.

Still have a couple weeks until I move the tank into my new house so I guess I'll keep thinking and running through all the pros and cons of my options.

Thanks!

 

[vabben]

You may want to research the lead times on the tanks you are considering as well. Due to COVID, the lead times on some tanks can be many weeks out.

 

[AKay3600]

You may want to research the lead times on the tanks you are considering as well. Due to COVID, the lead times on some tanks can be many weeks out.

Thanks for the tip! Just bought a new couch and it's 2 months until delivery...at best, so I wouldn't doubt a tank is the same. I'm thinking about a Reefer 250 or a Fiji Cube 48ext or 57. I believe I could get the Fiji a bit earlier but I also may check with some local stores to see what they have.

 

[N3mo]

If you have time on your hands, I would suggest making a new scape, maybe new sand and let that cycle with beneficial bacteria and a maybe a fish to feed the system and let it cycle.

Then once ready you only move livestock Into new system.

 

[AKay3600]

If you have time on your hands, I would suggest making a new scape, maybe new sand and let that cycle with beneficial bacteria and a maybe a fish to feed the system and let it cycle.

Then once ready you only move livestock Into new system.

Well I plan on using most of the rock that I currently have, which is more than enough for my 29 so I think I will only need a few pieces of dry rock. But yeah I do plan on removing all the corals and setting up a full new scape before putting the fish and corals back in. Shouldn't really need to let it cycle since the rocks I have are 6 years old and should be plenty for my small fish bioload. Will give it a bit of time to settle in before I start adding more fish though.