cycling dead rock

[bewaretheblond]

i am moving my 75 tall into a shorter, wider 80 so i will have room for more rock. i bought 5 big pieces (about 60 lbs) of dead, completely dry, base rock that had been sitting on a shelf. i cleaned the dust off of it with the hose and put it in the new tank, with new, rinsed sand (not live), and enough new salt water to cover the rock. i put in 2 ph's and a heater and figured after the salt mixed i could add all my stuff from my other tank.
but in 2 days the ammonia was .75. how could this be if there was absolutely nothing alive in there? and now what do i do, do i need to put something with bacteria in there to make a cycle? or can i just take completely change all the water and see if whatever made the ammonia is gone now?
thanks

 

[m0nk]

Originally Posted by bewaretheblond
http:///forum/post/2534508
i am moving my 75 tall into a shorter, wider 80 so i will have room for more rock. i bought 5 big pieces (about 60 lbs) of dead, completely dry, base rock that had been sitting on a shelf. i cleaned the dust off of it with the hose and put it in the new tank, with new, rinsed sand (not live), and enough new salt water to cover the rock. i put in 2 ph's and a heater and figured after the salt mixed i could add all my stuff from my other tank.
but in 2 days the ammonia was .75. how could this be if there was absolutely nothing alive in there? and now what do i do, do i need to put something with bacteria in there to make a cycle? or can i just take completely change all the water and see if whatever made the ammonia is gone now?
thanks
I'd first get a second opinion on the readings (take some water to the LFS), but it is possible if it was sitting on a shelf that insects could have crawled into some holes and died when it was put in water. Are you planning on adding any live rock in the tank?

 

[tizzo]

Yeah that's just weird, if your second opinion results are the same, you may wanna look at your water ammonia levels, and if it has none, you may even wanna consider the salt. I've only seen it once, but it can happen.