Real Reef Rock, CaribSea Life Rock and A Purple Reef Rock - Side by Side Pics

[malacoda]

Thought some pics of 3 brands of man-made rocks side-by-side — CaribSea Life Rock, A Purple Reef and Real Reef Rock — might be helpful to those who are trying to choose...


Clockwise from upper left — Caribsea Life Rock ... A Purple Reef rock ... Real Reef Rock:

CaribSea Life Rock:

A Purple Reef rock:

Real Reef Rock (afraid I only have a few large, broken rubble pieces left to photograph, but they should provide some idea of the color, porosity, etc.):

 

[P-Dub]

Thanks. Helpful.

 

[Bouncingsoul39]

Nice to show people but this dead rock makes reefkeeping harder and take longer than it needs to. Using aquaculture real ocean live rock is the best way to go.
It’s the key that moved the hobby forward into successfully keeping SPS corals and was the gold standard for decades before it fell to an aggressive marketing campaign and no one cared to defend it. I’m hoping the trend will move back towards real ocean live rock.
Here’s my three month old tank. No ugly stage. Anemone and Acropora thriving.

 

[MaxTremors]

Nice to show people but this dead rock makes reefkeeping harder and take longer than it needs to. Using aquaculture real ocean live rock is the best way to go.
It’s the key that moved the hobby forward into successfully keeping SPS corals and was the gold standard for decades before it fell to an aggressive marketing campaign and no one cared to defend it. I’m hoping the trend will move back towards real ocean live rock.
Here’s my three month old tank. No ugly stage. Anemone and Acropora thriving.

I have to agree not a fan of dry rock. Used it for the first time in my most recent tank and I hate it. I seeded with around 25% live rock, and all the live rock is clean and looks great, all of the dry rock (caribsea life rock) is covered in GHA/Derbesia and looks awful. Will never use dry rock again.

 

[tautog83]

I just ask a friend to put 5 pounds in his sump for like 2 weeks and it makes good starter live rock then again he has a huge system

 

[MaxTremors]

I just ask a friend to put 5 pounds in his sump for like 2 weeks and it makes good starter live rock then again he has a huge system

IME, I think it takes a good 4-5 months to turn dry rock into live rock. After two weeks it’ll have some bacteria, but to get fully saturated and colonized by all the microfauna, it takes quite a bit longer than 2 weeks.

 

[Uncle99]

Thought some pics of 3 brands of man-made rocks side-by-side — CaribSea Life Rock, A Purple Reef and Real Reef Rock — might be helpful to those who are trying to choose...


Clockwise from upper left — Caribsea Life Rock ... A Purple Reef rock ... Real Reef Rock:

CaribSea Life Rock:

A Purple Reef rock:

Real Reef Rock (afraid I only have a few large, broken rubble pieces left to photograph, but they should provide some idea of the color, porosity, etc.):

Hey thanks, good to show.
I always use the Carib Sea Rock, bottle of Dr. Tim’s and ready to go.
Too, too many pests on LR for me.
6 months from dry.
No shrimps, no crabs, no Aptasia, no manjos, just rock.

 

[malacoda]

Nice to show people but this dead rock makes reefkeeping harder and take longer than it needs to. Using aquaculture real ocean live rock is the best way to go.
It’s the key that moved the hobby forward into successfully keeping SPS corals and was the gold standard for decades before it fell to an aggressive marketing campaign and no one cared to defend it. I’m hoping the trend will move back towards real ocean live rock.
Here’s my three month old tank. No ugly stage. Anemone and Acropora thriving.

Not necessarily, it depends on how you use it...

FWIW, I'm a HUGE fan of live aqua-cultured rock. I love the life it adds to the tank ... from the microbes and coraline algae right up to the sea squirts and bivalves.

But, after picking up some dry rock to both boost the amount of rock in my DT and create a cryptic area in my sump, I had quite a bit left over ... along with an unused 10g tank and a bunch of equipment sitting in a closet. So, decided to start up the nano using the dry rock after seeding the dry rock in my 65g sump for a few weeks.

Other than a brief two-week spell of mild dinos ... which I also have experienced in the past with aqua-cultured rock (it's about nutrient levels not the rock itself) ... the 10g started with dry rock is doing just fine. No pest algae and no other issues.

I'm also going to be upgrading my main 65g to a 120g in a couple of weeks. And I plan on incorporating two closed loops hidden in the rock work...

The easiest and most certain way to ensure I have an stable rock formation around each closed-loop outlet pipe to place my existing aqua-cultured live rock on is to cement some dry rock together to form bases around the pipes.

Dry rock can be a valuable tool.

And ANY rock will have it pros and cons...

It all depends on how you treat it/use it.

 

[malacoda]

IME, I think it takes a good 4-5 months to turn dry rock into live rock. After two weeks it’ll have some bacteria, but to get fully saturated and colonized by all the microfauna, it takes quite a bit longer than 2 weeks.

+1 the more time the better ... to a point of course.

Soaked 80% the dry rock I used for my 10g in the sump of my 65g for about 7 weeks. Would've let it soak it bit longer ... but wanted to get my 10g set up before I beginning the process of upgrading my 65g to a 120g.