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

[MnFish1]

Alright, our experiences differ.

Do you believe there is a lack of nitrifying bacteria in the 200 pounds of ocean direct rock, and that is the issue that is allowing the ammonia to spike?

No I believe that there a a lot of living things that when put into a glass box of water - die - en masse - and I think this has been true since people were buying live rock 40 years ago. SO - I guess - as I've said multiple times - live rock contains bacteria up to and to the point where there is ammonia available. (These are made up numbers) let's say in the ocean - the environment the rock is in an area producing xx ppm ammonia.day. Then all the sudden they are removed - and put into a tank - producing xxxx4 ppm ammonia/day. IMHO - they will not process that ammonia until the bacteria builds up.

 

[MnFish1]

Unfortunately I cannot link you. I'm not a save for later guy. I'm a read all day and try to remember guy.

For the record, I dose straight ammonia to rock curing tanks and my anomia alert badges never change. Fun to have around, I question their efficacy as well. It would be amazing if they worked as described, especially in tenths of a PPM.

The issue is - let's take a different measurement - that everyone is familiar with - body temperature. Let's say the golden standard is 98.6 F. Let's pretend that a company came up with a measurement that could accurately measure body temperature to .000001 degrees. Let's say someone's temperature is 97.999999 degrees - who cares. There are chemical formulae - with which (if you have temperature, total ammonia, salinity and pH) can accurately calculate your free ammonia. I would potentially google one of those - and plug in the results - lets say using salinity of 35, temperature of 78 and pH of 8 - then type in the various amounts of lets say an API test - 0, 0.25, 0.5, 1.00 ppm total ammonia. Let me know when the number gets higher than the 'alarm' level on the Seneye.

 

[MnFish1]

Should not have used the water in the box first of all.

I would dose prime

Don't necessarily agree with Prime - Do agree - not using the water in the box

 

[MnFish1]

Alright, our experiences differ.

Do you believe there is a lack of nitrifying bacteria in the 200 pounds of ocean direct rock, and that is the issue that is allowing the ammonia to spike?

PS - I was wondering about your specific experience?

 

[monkeyCmonkeyDo]

I've always taken live rock and cured rock from petstores and placed it directly into the fish tank. I've never tried to qt it like this.
How's the rock doing @((FORDTECH)) ?!
D

 

[jDoSe]

I think it may just have to do with amount of die-off per gallon of water.
You have 200lbs of rock in a 100gal container. However, with that much rock in the container, you have much less than 100gal water, even with the 40breeder.

For dry rock or semi-cycled rock, no problem. But this is ocean rock with die-off. A higher ammonia will cause things to die, which causes more ammonia. It’s just more concentrated with less water.

I’ve bought the kp aquatics rocks in the past multiple times. Love the stuff. I buy the starter rock because I only want the bacteria. Just as good imo. Only things i remove are the large branching sponges that are super thick and “meaty” (and already dying/dead). All other sponges, tunicates, and seasquirts are still alive and doing well, even after being out of the water for two hours when I got them and months in the tank.

When i add it, I do it slowly. My current tank i added 5lbs in 25g tank. I have the hanna ammonia checker and never had a spike. I actually dose ammonium chloride every day. I couldn’t imagine 50lb in my 25. I’d be killing things just stacking the rocks.

 

[Lost in the Sauce]

No I believe that there a a lot of living things that when put into a glass box of water - die - en masse - and I think this has been true since people were buying live rock 40 years ago. SO - I guess - as I've said multiple times - live rock contains bacteria up to and to the point where there is ammonia available. (These are made up numbers) let's say in the ocean - the environment the rock is in an area producing xx ppm ammonia.day. Then all the sudden they are removed - and put into a tank - producing xxxx4 ppm ammonia/day. IMHO - they will not process that ammonia until the bacteria builds up.

We fully agree here. Bacterial colonization will only expand until It reaches equilibrium with its food source or I suppose run out of colonization surface but I don't know if that's actually a thing.

The point of that was that adding bottled bac will be a Slow process of effectively Lowering no3/no4 and ford was already into toxic levels. Removing the decomposing organics would be a much faster way to manage the spike to correct the imbalance.

The issue is - let's take a different measurement - that everyone is familiar with - body temperature. Let's say the golden standard is 98.6 F. Let's pretend that a company came up with a measurement that could accurately measure body temperature to .000001 degrees. Let's say someone's temperature is 97.999999 degrees - who cares. There are chemical formulae - with which (if you have temperature, total ammonia, salinity and pH) can accurately calculate your free ammonia. I would potentially google one of those - and plug in the results - lets say using salinity of 35, temperature of 78 and pH of 8 - then type in the various amounts of lets say an API test - 0, 0.25, 0.5, 1.00 ppm total ammonia. Let me know when the number gets higher than the 'alarm' level on the Seneye.

Not gonna lie, that Was either a bit over my head, or you Lost me.

 

[MnFish1]

We fully agree here. Bacterial colonization will only expand until It reaches equilibrium with its food source or I suppose run out of colonization surface but I don't know if that's actually a thing.

The point of that was that adding bottled bac will be a Slow process of effectively Lowering no3/no4 and ford was already into toxic levels. Removing the decomposing organics would be a much faster way to manage the spike to correct the imbalance.

Not gonna lie, that Was either a bit over my head, or you Lost me.

I agree once there are 'toxic levels of ammonia' the best thing would be removing the dead things (in live rock this is extremely difficult - when they are in holes in the rock) - as well as a 100% water change. After that - I personally would add lets say Fritz 9000.

I will say 'it was over your head. LOl - just kidding. It was only an analogy. In other words that Seneye measures toxic 'free ammonia'. I'm saying that using any total ammonia test (pick your brand) - you can calculate the same free ammonia level - using salinity, temperature, pH and total ammonia. For example: https://www.hamzasreef.com/Contents/Calculators/FreeAmmonia.php

i.e. there is no magic to a Seneye IMHO

 

[Lost in the Sauce]

PS - I was wondering about your specific experience?

My most recent experience comes from I'd say about 4-5 months ago, helping a local reefer move $150 gallon tank from one home to his new home.

Extremely Long story condensed.

The tank that was moved was not completely washed out after pulling all of the sand out leaving Maybe a cup of yuck water and some gross stuff in it. Sand was replaced.

When the sump was hooked up and water started flowing, there was a slight tinge of brown cloudiness to the water which I wasn't comfortable with so we hooked up a power filter for a few hours.

I was worried about an ammonia spike so I ran to the big box store that was still opened and bought every bottle of bac available as well as multiple bottles of ammo lock. Those dumped in.

Live rock with acro colonies were added back in. ( Too soon)

Over the next two days, ammonia spiked killing 90% of the inhabitants. When ammonia reading wouldn't fall, I took as many of the fish and coral as I could hold to my systems. We saved a lot.

Only large water changes were effective in lowering the Ammonia. I would say what ended up being gallon or two of starter bacteria had No effect on tested limits.

 

[KrisReef]

My wife got drunk last night and yelled at me in her sleep for 45 minutes. “My live rock is too mushy!” What good is a reef discussion if we can scream hysterically at each other about things we actually agree on but the medium of communication is hampering the consumption of understanding?
I hope my point is fully misunderstood so that all replies are even further from the subject of the original thread topic, “Living rock is lost at the airport,” or something along that time line.
( Nice gif’s and secret message embedded in the reply, superior effort!)

 

[d2mini]

This is the first LONG thread I've read every post. And man i have the same anxiety as the OP. I would be as mad as fordtech. That's a lot of money to spend just to see issues. I mean what possibly could you have done different? Maybe have that brute pre-cycled IDK.

It's simple. The live rock (and sand if you got it) comes out of the shipping bag and goes direct to a running tank. NO SHIPPING WATER! Pull the rocks out, knock off any hitchhijers you know you don't want or want to inspect later, and drop that rock into FRESH saltwater in a runnin tank. If you got sand, you drain as much of the nasty water out as possible and then get that into the same running tank (before the rock).

This would have prevented what is happening here. I've had so many shipments from TBS and NEVER had an issue. I would think it would be the same from KP.

Someone earlier mentioned the rock is collected by pulling out of the ocean and transporting in dry buckets. I sure hope not! That rock should be transported submerged in seawater to minimize die-off until it is back at the holding facility where it is quickly transferred to their holding system.

Follow all this and it should be no different than if you took a bunch of rock out of a tank you had running on one side of your living room and put it into a tank you have running on the other side. Ready for fish and coral within DAYS.

 

[Lost in the Sauce]

I agree once there are 'toxic levels of ammonia' the best thing would be removing the dead things (in live rock this is extremely difficult - when they are in holes in the rock) - as well as a 100% water change. After that - I personally would add lets say Fritz 9000.

I will say 'it was over your head. LOl - just kidding. It was only an analogy. In other words that Seneye measures toxic 'free ammonia'. I'm saying that using any total ammonia test (pick your brand) - you can calculate the same free ammonia level - using salinity, temperature, pH and total ammonia. For example: https://www.hamzasreef.com/Contents/Calculators/FreeAmmonia.php

i.e. there is no magic to a Seneye IMHO

I'm easily Lost. You know this by now haha.

I'm not claiming there is any magic to a seneye, simply that it is a tool that can be used to measure as well as log levels and trends. That's sort of data logging isn't available with titration kits or a color changing film unless you are doing it manually.

 

[MnFish1]

My most recent experience comes from I'd say about 4-5 months ago, helping a local reefer move $150 gallon tank from one home to his new home.

Extremely Long story condensed.

The tank that was moved was not completely washed out after pulling all of the sand out leaving Maybe a cup of yuck water and some gross stuff in it. Sand was replaced.

When the sump was hooked up and water started flowing, there was a slight tinge of brown cloudiness to the water which I wasn't comfortable with so we hooked up a power filter for a few hours.

I was worried about an ammonia spike so I ran to the big box store that was still opened and bought every bottle of bac available as well as multiple bottles of ammo lock. Those dumped in.

Live rock with acro colonies were added back in. ( Too soon)

Over the next two days, ammonia spiked killing 90% of the inhabitants. When ammonia reading wouldn't fall, I took as many of the fish and coral as I could hold to my systems. We saved a lot.

Only large water changes were effective in lowering the Ammonia. I would say what ended up being gallon or two of starter bacteria had No effect on tested limits.

I agree with you - I do not think that you can fix toxic ammonia quickly enough - to save a toxicity problem - because as the least susceptible things die - more ammonia is produced. I also agree that adding the 'bad water, etc' to the tank was probably an issue - and likely related (perhpas??) more to hydrogen sulfide - than ammonia - that could have also caused a downward death cascade

 

[Lost in the Sauce]

My wife got drunk last night and yelled at me in her sleep for 45 minutes. “My live rock is too mushy!”

Isn't there a blue pill for stiffening live rock?

 

[doubleshot00]

My most recent experience comes from I'd say about 4-5 months ago, helping a local reefer move $150 gallon tank from one home to his new home.

Extremely Long story condensed.

The tank that was moved was not completely washed out after pulling all of the sand out leaving Maybe a cup of yuck water and some gross stuff in it. Sand was replaced.

When the sump was hooked up and water started flowing, there was a slight tinge of brown cloudiness to the water which I wasn't comfortable with so we hooked up a power filter for a few hours.

I was worried about an ammonia spike so I ran to the big box store that was still opened and bought every bottle of bac available as well as multiple bottles of ammo lock. Those dumped in.

Live rock with acro colonies were added back in. ( Too soon)

Over the next two days, ammonia spiked killing 90% of the inhabitants. When ammonia reading wouldn't fall, I took as many of the fish and coral as I could hold to my systems. We saved a lot.

Only large water changes were effective in lowering the Ammonia. I would say what ended up being gallon or two of starter bacteria had No effect on tested limits.

I don’t get this. How can a small amount of leftover tank water do this. I just did a tank transfer over a month ago and used probably 30-40% of my old tank water.

Was the okd tank water stagnant for a long period of time?

 

[KrisReef]

I don’t get this. How can a small amount of leftover tank water do this. I just did a tank transfer over a month ago and used probably 30-40% of my old tank water.

Was the okd tank water stagnant for a long period of time?

Probably the concentrated gunk that had settled in the gravel over time, more than “old water” from the tank. A toxic soup of nutrients and waste products that should have been washed out before new water was added?.

 

[d2mini]

I don’t get this. How can a small amount of leftover tank water do this. I just did a tank transfer over a month ago and used probably 30-40% of my old tank water.

Was the okd tank water stagnant for a long period of time?

If the water you used was taken out as if you were just doing a water change, no problem. There is nothing good or bad in your water column (which is why using old water to start a new tank is pointless other than saving water). But if you were to have stirred up the sand bed and then used brown water... not so good, my friend. Same reason never to use old unrinsed sand other than a handful if you want to seed a new tank.

 

[Lost in the Sauce]

I don’t get this. How can a small amount of leftover tank water do this. I just did a tank transfer over a month ago and used probably 30-40% of my old tank water.

Was the okd tank water stagnant for a long period of time?

IMHO, It wasn't the water that was the issue as we barely transferred over 25% of the old water. It was the under sand sludge which again likely was not a measuring cup worth.

The same phenomenon has been seen time and time again by pulling sand out and reusing it without washing first. The organics quickly degrade and become toxic.

A lot of people have gotten away with it. A lot have gotten burned by it. Why that works, I have no idea.

 

[doubleshot00]

IMHO, It wasn't the water that was the issue as we barely transferred over 25% of the old water. It was the under sand sludge which again likely was not a measuring cup worth.

The same phenomenon has been seen time and time again by pulling sand out and reusing it without washing first. The organics quickly degrade and become toxic.

A lot of people have gotten away with it. A lot have gotten burned by it. Why that works, I have no idea.

Yeah didn’t BRS test this with one if there test tanks recently. I mean that tank had a lot of issues but the fish were just fine.

 

[Lost in the Sauce]

Yeah didn’t BRS test this with one if there test tanks recently. I mean that tank had a lot of issues but the fish were just fine.

I don't know. I quit watching BRS videos when they were pushing the NSA scape fad which predictably, they figured out "looked cool, bad as a fish habitat" even a few investigates videos started to feel like a BRS promotion.

I'd watch that video though to see their conclusion