Live Rock Whats good or Bad

[loseriam]

I had purchased LR from a LFS and it had a lot of black soft what appeared to dead decay, it also had bumps that looked like barnicles but I am not sure is this stuff suppose to be there. Plus it made my whole house stink. I then figured I would rinse it all off and rubbed a lot off with my hands, is that ok. I also changed half the water in my tank because it stunk so bad.
How long till the rock cycles and how long till I can put in hermit crabs, snails and shrimps. And is there any thing that I shoud put in there besides them to start.
Thank you
loseriam

 

[aarone]

Probably about 3 weeks. Just monitor the Ammonia nitrite and nitrate. after ammonia and nitrite are both at zero, i would do a 50% water change to get the nitrates down.
aaron

 

[birdy]

All that is perfectly normal for LR that is not cured, it is actually good to cycle your tank with it. Put it in the tank and start monitoring your cycle. If you have a protein skimmer I would go ahead and run it if the die off is that bad.
You do not want to add anything to the tank until the cycle is completely finished. That is Ammonia 0, Nitrite 0, Nitrate below 40, then you want to do a 25% water change and monitor your tank for a few more days to be sure it is stable. After that time you will want to add a cleanup crew because you will probably have a decent amount of algae in the tank (perfectly normal).

 

[loseriam]

What will happen if I add the hermit crabs now I have a few from before. I did all this I cycled my tank without rock and added a few crabs. I seen a couple of snails die when I added the rock so thats why I cleaned it.

 

[aarone]

they might die due to ammonia.
aaron

 

[birdy]

If the LR smells as bad as you say it does, then your ammonia and nitrite levels are probably through the roof (do you have a test kit? if not buy one!). Anything you put in there will more than likely die.

 

[zanemoseley]

I'd suggest using a toothbrush to scrub the rock to remove the dead and decaying stuff, I have a 75 and just put in 25lb of Caribbean rock in a week ago and my cycle is almost done already

 

[genx]

Be patient before adding any livestock to your tank! Use a good power head to blow the decay off of the LR.....

 

[nm reef]

Sounds like a good batch of un-cured LR...which is good stuff to cycle a new system with. Most places suggest that you remove as much of the dead and decaying material as possible. Then simply allow the LR to provide the ammonia source for your cycle. It is a time consuming process but in my opinion its also one of the best ways to initially cycle a marine system.
I would run a skimmer plus provide some decent circulation...and I'd definitely suggest a set of test kits that can accurately measure ammonia/nitrite/nitrate...and I would not add any livestock until the levels all stabalise at zero. There is a ton of info available on cycling a system...I'd urge you to research the topic and above all be patient. In time you'll have the foundation for a very nice system...but it will take time to complete the process.:thinking: