The live rock is free, but cursed (aiptasia)

Danj

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A buddy of mine is getting out of the hobby and is gifting me all of his live rock. Trouble is, he's got "some aiptasia." I'm in no rush to toss this stuff in my display tank, so I've got plenty of time to get rid of the infestation in isolation - though if I can preserve the biome of the rock, I'd definitely prefer to do that. I do eventually want to get this stuff in the DT though, since I upgraded from a 40g to 120g last year, and still have more or less the same rocks. So I'm exploring what low-maintenance options I have for ridding myself of this plague - 'low-maintenance' because I'm generally predisposed to laziness, and with an 18 month-old waddling around here, I don't have much time to futz with things even if I were more energetically inclined.

Anyway, Plan B is to just bleach it all and start over. I figure that if the only other viable options are targeted assassinations à la Aiptasia-X, then I'll probably just go Plan B. But I figure there must be something I can do to preserve most of the biome in these rocks and get them ready for the tank without too much futzing and waiting.

I can set up a quarantine tank with light, filter, heater, and have my way with them chemically. Are there any options in that vein? I tried searching to see if copper treatment (or some other whole-tank chemical treatment) was a thing for aiptasia, but it doesn't seem to come up very often since most people are trying to rid it from their display tanks.

Any other suggestions also welcome! Thanks!

edit: On second thought, maybe this isn't best subforum for this post. If any mods agree, please feel free to move - no hard feelings :)
 

Samina

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How about using kalk paste on those areas? I don’t think you’ll mess up the biome of the rock while you work with it in isolation as long as you keep it wet. Spray bottle can help with that. Maybe, if you have a tote or other larger container, fill that up with SW and grab a piece of rock out of there and work on it. That way you can keep them separate and also keep their biological integrity intact. How prevalent is the aiptasia?
 

arturoo1977

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I had same situation with 40lb of free live rock.
But as my tank is a new setup, I decide to bleach it out completely. But obviously it was not anymore “live” rock....
I guess if you can isolate them and separate the ones clean and others, you should be ok
Just let them in QT before add them to display
 

flsalty

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I would go with a QT type tank*. I understand the "new school" way is to kill everything, but that doesn't make sense to me. QT with a cheap HOB filter, heater and you wouldn't even need any special lighting. Then pick your method of removal.

* Note that I tend to come up with reasons to buy extra tanks
 

Daniel@R2R

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Danj

Danj

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Thanks for all the replies!

re: Blackout w/ heat and circulation - I do like this is as an alternative to Plan B(leach). Only bummer would be that I'd lose all the nice coraline that he's built up over the years, but that'll come back since there's plenty of that in my display tank already. Ultimately I think this is what I'm going to do unless I encounter any promising chemical treatments.

re: target treatments and predators - I don't think this would give me enough confidence to put the rocks in display tank, at least not until after a long observation period to make sure there's no resurgance. For something that is said to regenerate from a single living cell, it just seems too easy to claim a false victory.
 

Ashish Patel

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aiptasia are resilient I doubt they would die with no light. I would go to to town on the rock where the aiptasia with some powertool and remove the top layer. Then QT it

I am setting up a large system so want to use some Live rock - I am thinking about getting florida Liverock but def want to QT it. I was thinking maybe have it semi submersed with a spray bar. This way only bacteria survives. Sponges would definitely die but I could always seed it later with the sponges I have in my current system. There is not enough information out on QT rock just going with Dry rock which never works without good bacteria seeding in the first place.
 
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Danj

Danj

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Figured this thread was due an update in case it's ever excavated from the waste bin of the internet.

The original plan was 2 months in darkness in rubbermaid bins with heaters set to ~78 and a powerhead to move things around. 12 months later (Dec 2020), I finally got around to pulling them out of quarantine and rearranging the scape with the new rocks. It's now 7ish months after that, and I'm happy to report that the quarantine plan worked perfectly. Not a single new pest in sight, and the rock has been great. Glad I didn't get rid of it, because Pukani is nice rock that's hard to come by these days.

For what it's worth, I can't really say if the rock re-cycled when it hit my tank because (1) I tested my water like once in the last 6 months, and 0 times for ammonia/nitrite and (2) I left all my old rock in the rock and either worked it in to the 'scape or moved it down to the sump
 

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