Curing live rock (Help)

life~reefer

Member
I want to add a few more small pieces of live rock rubble for a ricordea garden. How long do i have to cure it in a bucket?
 

salt life

Active Member
Originally Posted by Life~Reefer
http:///forum/post/2969762
I want to add a few more small pieces of live rock rubble for a ricordea garden. How long do i have to cure it in a bucket?
until you see the levels stabalize.. You have the pieces in a bucket with a powerhead and a heater?
 

nystyle182

New Member
what happens it there is no power head while curing just saltwater and heated water? does it make a diffrence with fii rock? what exactly does curing do anyway?
 
A

allenk

Guest
Originally Posted by Nystyle182
http:///forum/post/2969953
what happens it there is no power head while curing just saltwater and heated water? does it make a diffrence with fii rock? what exactly does curing do anyway?

Without a power head, there would be less circulation.

You want circulation because during the transfer of the rocks, some of the live things would have died and are decaying. As they decay, they will break down in the normal aquarium cycle of ammonia, nitrites, nitrates. Your ammonia will spike then go to zero, the same with nitrites. When both ammonia and nitrites are at zero, then your rock is cycled. (though you may need to change some water in order to get nitrates back down within appropriate parameters.)
What the cycling does twofold: first, as discussed above, it gets rid of the dead stuff and the effect of dead stuff on the water quality in your tank. The way it does this, (the 2nd thing) is to grow a culture of a couple types of beneficial bacteria. The excess ammonia feeds a growth of one type of bacteria which produces nitrite as a waste product. Then, another type of bacteria that eats nitrite grows and produces nitrates as a waste product. Once the colony of ammonia eating and nitrite eating bacteria are large enough to handle the "load", then the tank is cycled.

The power head helps move the water around to all areas of the rock and also helps oxygenate the water.
 

nystyle182

New Member
you seem to know your stuff............... thank you very very much,,,,,,,,, i hope if its okay to ask you a bunch of questions in the future? like i got one now
 

nystyle182

New Member
sorry i pushed wrong button, i was told that since i bought my live fiji rock from a tank that was brokrn down less then a week before i bought it. he had i in a bin with salt water. i took it home changer the water and added a heater. i m currently cycling the tank a 72 bow tank with a fluval 405 and two aqua clear 50 power heads. i was told to dump the 80 lbs of live rock into tank and let those cure the rock while its going in to its second week of the 4 week cycle. good idea? he did it,,,, and his rock went from white to colors in about a week n half........ im not very lucky what do u think?
 
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