Sitting at the airport waiting to pick up 200lbs of kp aquatics premium live rock how exciting !!!!

[Lost in the Sauce]

Just tested ammonia again it’s still over 3ppm smh

Keep on it man. How Big of a water change can you do? do it then retest. How are the stars looking? Still wet skimming?

 

[vetteguy53081]

Smell is less and it’s less cloudy

Adding bacteria to contents?

 

[Lost in the Sauce]

Adding bacteria to contents?

What good are you going for? There isn't a lack of bacteria in this 200 pounds of ocean direct live rock. There's an abundance of free decaying particulate matter. Bottle BAC will do nothing for the ammonia problem.

Edit. 200lb, not 150

 

[vetteguy53081]

What good are you going for? There isn't a lack of bacteria in this 200 pounds of ocean direct live rock. There's an abundance of free decaying particulate matter. Bottle BAC will do nothing for the ammonia problem.

Edit. 200lb, not 150

Denitrification will lower ammonia if there is indeed dead matter within rock assuming he has rock submersed as if ammonia is present, likely so is nitrate
Owning a pet store , I had to deal with shipments similar to what he has and know a thing or two about salvaging rock

 

[Lost in the Sauce]

Denitrification will lower ammonia if there is indeed dead matter within rock assuming he has rock submersed as if ammonia is present, likely so is nitrate
Owning a pet store , I had to deal with shipments similar to what he has and know a thing or two about salvaging rock

Denitrification Will lower ammonia and there is Thousands of times more denitrifying bacteria on those rocks, than a case of snake oil bacteria containing One unknown strain that cannot be tested and isn't disclosed by the manufacturers.

Denitrifying bacteria need to settle and reproduce which can take days to weeks to actually start doing their jobs in an effective manner. They will only settle on clean areas not already populated.

With a reading of 3ppm ammonia, that is Way too long and about everything will be dead. You could pour all of the fritz turbo start on your pet store shelves in the rock holding container and it will do nothing.

 

[Tavero]

Live rock varies Greatly as I'm sure you know. Order 10 pounds to Europa, and let's discuss.

Yeah... if you are implying i need to buy the exact same rock from the exact same shop, just to be able to argue with you, im done here.
That's as stupid as saying i can't criticise the performance of a car unless i have built one myself.
Maybe i don't want to buy rock that is packed so deeply with garbage (your words, not mine) that I need to blast it with as much flow as possible to cure it. Are you actually paying for rock or silt? (Im being sarcastic here because you are ridiculous)
Just so you know. Your rock? That's calciumcarbonate populated with different species of nitrosomonas and nitrobacter same as every other rock you pull out of the ocean on the planet. Hitchhiker and porosity may be different but that's it.

He needs to blast the stones with air not flow. Even a skimmer would be better than an overabundance of flow to remove organic matter.

 

[Miami Reef]

Wow. Who knew adding live rock would be so difficult. My experience with KP was not like this.

I think “blasting” the rocks with extreme flow to removed “caked” organics is excessive. But IMO adding oxygenation (skimmer, surface agitation) is a good idea. If ammonia is climbing really high, I wouldn’t hesitate to do water changes. The natural bacteria will naturally expand their populations.


The sponges from my KP rocks stayed alive and are currently reproducing. I don’t think it’s rocket science.

That being said, I did try moving the rocks into the tank asap because I didn’t have a light on my bin and didn’t want any die off.

 

[Miami Reef]

The main reason I added KP rocks was to add filter feeders and biodiversity to predate on fish ich. Not sure if the rocks had an impact, but I am not struggling with parasites even though I know I have ich.

 

[Lost in the Sauce]

That's as stupid as saying i can't criticise the performance of a car unless i have built one myself.

No, it would be equivalent to saying your can't criticize how a specific car drives without driving it. I own this car. (Ford may have gotten a lemon though. I never had any Ammonia issues)

Just because you've driven another car, doesn't give you insight to all of them.

Watch the KP aquatic videos. See the plot.

Maybe i don't want to buy rock that is packed so deeply with garbage (your words, not mine) that I need to blast it with as much flow as possible to cure it.

I'd advise you try it. It's Sexy.

Besides that, all Rock coming out of the ocean will be packed with garbage ( an American genetic word for undesirables) to some degree which I think we can agree on.

Leaving pores packed with the gunk ( maybe you like that word better) doesn't Help the rock process Ammonia. I think we can agree there also?

So why put that in your tank? I'd love my expensive rock to not be handicapped from day one.

Are you actually paying for rock or silt? (Im being sarcastic here because you are ridiculous)

We agree on that last part

Just so you know. Your rock? That's calciumcarbonate populated with different species of nitrosomonas and nitrobacter same as every other rock you pull out of the ocean on the planet. Hitchhiker and porosity may be different but that's it.

The rocks have the same composition. We agree. Rock from the same geographic region have the same bacterial composition. We agree. Rock harvested in the tidal zone are much cleaner ( less deposits in the pores) than rocks 100 ft down in a slow moving silt bed. That's not hard. I can explain that to a 3-year-old. Cleaner pores are more effective. They part may need 11-12 or whenever they start teaching biology..

He needs to blast the stones with air not flow. Even a skimmer would be better than an overabundance of flow to remove organic matter.

More Air flow would Also be helpful to the immediate ammonia spike. No disagreement.

The skimmer is running.

 

[EeyoreIsMySpiritAnimal]

Yeah... if you are implying i need to buy the exact same rock from the exact same shop, just to be able to argue with you, im done here.
That's as stupid as saying i can't criticise the performance of a car unless i have built one myself.
Maybe i don't want to buy rock that is packed so deeply with garbage (your words, not mine) that I need to blast it with as much flow as possible to cure it. Are you actually paying for rock or silt? (Im being sarcastic here because you are ridiculous)
Just so you know. Your rock? That's calciumcarbonate populated with different species of nitrosomonas and nitrobacter same as every other rock you pull out of the ocean on the planet. Hitchhiker and porosity may be different but that's it.

He needs to blast the stones with air not flow. Even a skimmer would be better than an overabundance of flow to remove organic matter.

@Tavero , with all due respect, can you dial it back a couple notches? You're totally detailing the thread.

 

[reeftwincities]

I think you’re worrying a little too much. Yes, try to reduce ammonia. But chances are…it will cycle fast enough and plenty of the fauna will survive. The benefits will continue years from now when you still see “new” stuff pop out of the rock. Good luck!

 

[Lost in the Sauce]

@Tavero , with all due respect, can you dial it back a couple notches? You're totally detailing the thread.

 

[Lost in the Sauce]

I think you’re worrying a little too much. Yes, try to reduce ammonia. But chances are…it will cycle fast enough and plenty of the fauna will survive. The benefits will continue years from now when you still see “new” stuff pop out of the rock. Good luck!

I'm still finding new awesome stuff constantly. @((FORDTECH)) I'm stoked For you. Hit it with red light a few hours before lights on... It's Insane.

 

[EeyoreIsMySpiritAnimal]

Naw, you're making sense... There's a difference

 

[MPCReefer]

I think you’re worrying a little too much. Yes, try to reduce ammonia. But chances are…it will cycle fast enough and plenty of the fauna will survive. The benefits will continue years from now when you still see “new” stuff pop out of the rock. Good luck!

Concur with this. I ordered about 20-30 lbs to add to my new display after a couple month quarantine period. Experienced some die off including ammonia spike but still had plenty of life that survived and made it to the display. Keep at it, maybe add some Seachem Prime every couple days for a week or so, and you should be fine.

 

[Reefing102]

Don’t give up on it. While I did not have any issues, like you’re experiencing, with the 80lbs I ordered (and placed directly into my tank), I think you will be pleasantly surprised at how much life survives. I would say keep skimming, if practical, I’d keep up with the large, if not 80-100% water changes,

 

[2KrazyKidz]

Just commenting that I really am interested to see how this works out for you. Wish you the best. Keep posting pics as well.

 

[((FORDTECH))]

Keep on it man. How Big of a water change can you do? do it then retest. How are the stars looking? Still wet skimming?

Crazy to how I really see nothing in the container anymore!! I picked up a few rocks to fillip over and inspect and only seen 1 star was alive but barely moving. The 200 lbs is in 120 gallons of water been doing 50% changes every 8 hours and already been thru 300 gallons. I’m out of rodi at the moment making more. At this rate my 150gpd ro system is not keeping up. I got 40 gallons now maybe will have 200 by after work tomorrow. Yes I’m still skimming wet orangish brown slime

 

[((FORDTECH))]

Hmmm was thinking how wrong would it be to use tap water for my next batch of saltwater. Then I can do 100% very easily and quickly. I normally would never do this it’s just that won’t have any water ready for like 24hours and was thinking ways worse the high ammonia or using tap water with salt mix

 

[Tired]

You have an established system, right? Why not start pulling any macro hitchhikers (starfish, etc) that you want to keep and putting them in there instead?

The main benefit of ocean live rock is all the bacterial diversity. That's not going anywhere, that stuff's tough.

And, how bad the tap water would be depends on your tap. Some people have copper in their tap water, for one thing. Some people have tap water that isn't even safe to drink. Some have water that works fine for a reef, particularly if you don't mind algae. Most people have water somewhere in the middle.