TBS live rock

[phish1627]

Building my first reef tank, 40 gallon breeder display with sump. I am aquascaping with dry Marco rock. I will be adding bottled bacteria for the nitrogen cycle but want to add additional beneficial bacteria/overall diversity to my system. I am in the Tampa area and thinking of getting live wet rock from Tampa bay saltwater. Will adding 4lbs of TBS rock to the sump make much of a difference? Thinking of also putting about 2lbs of TBS live sand into the display and adding some of their “sludge” as well. Would 8lbs of live rock be significantly better?

 

[Uncle99]

Live rock makes a difference.
8 pounds versus 4 pounds not significantly different.
Live sand is good.

The caution will always be the introduction of pests.

I got 2 mantis shrimp which took out 3 fish, some palys that grew at an alarming rate and rendered the rock unusable and one or two Aptasia that took years to eradicate.

So a trade off.

These days I use just dry and build diversity each time I add corals.

 

[whalewhalewhale]

You won't get the full effect but it definitely will add more diversity than whatever is in the bottle.

 

[BriDroid]

I added some gulf live rock rubble to my sump on my 40 breeder, and the only pest I got was 1 aiptasia. I just removed that rock and tossed it. I also added a package of their grunge. The combo of them caused a small cyano outbreak that lasted about 4 days and it was gone. The rest of the tank was 50lbs Marco rock and 40lbs of Ocean Direct “Live” sand.

 

[kevgib67]

I upgraded in January and other than the rock I transferred over from my over 4 year old tank I did all TBS live rock and sand and don’t regret it .

 

[Abominable Snow Crab]

The more live rock the better IMO

 

[Randy Holmes-Farley Verified Community Expert]

I’m not sure I’d use bacteria in a bottle at all if you are adding a reasonable amount of live sand or rock.

More is not always better, especially of the unusual species that sometimes are in such bottles.