New Tank

[clasbya]

I am setting up a tank that I bought off of someone. He had live rock, which now is dry. Is there any special treatment I have to put the rck through at the beginning. Or can I just put them in the take as I wish and get the filters running as well as the two power jets that I will be purchasing as well.
Aaron

 

[marty]

Welcome to this board. You will find out of wonderful information here. Be patient with all of the items you do with your tank and spend wisely. Ask questions here before deciding to go forward. I wish I had found this site before I did everything. Would have save $$$, mucho $$$.
As for your rocks, unless something bad happened to them (i.e. dropped into gasoline , etc..), the rocks should be fine. They are not "live" as everything is dead on them now. If I was in your shoes, I would use this rock as a base as they will eventually become live rock again. Purchase new live rock to place on this old rock. Purchase live sand (4-6") for your bottom of the tank (I have heard great things from the ls (live sand) from swf.com, you might try getting 20-25lbs from here). Both your new lr and ls will help cycle your tank. Use this (or shrimp method) before adding any fish.
Hope this helps. Ask whatever questions you may have. You will get alot of good answers.

 

[clasbya]

Thanks for the helpful response. I have a 120gal tank, so I may need quite a bit of sand, though I know I can start small. I received like 50 lbs of rock from the guy so I am pretty good there though I am trading some with my friend that has a tank already set up with some cured live rock.
I am definately going to wait to get fish. I want to get the scenery built up a bit first, such as lr, ls, and maybe a corral or two, then get crabs, snail, and shrimp, then on to the fish...

 

[jonthefb]

now i dont want to sound like im trying to sell something here, buti used to work at my local lfs, and we would use a product called reef DNA when we set up any new tnaks or got shipments of live rock in. The Reef DNA is a Marc Weiss product(all of which i love so far)that basically helps to cure your rock, and encourages the grow out of all the little organisms that normally occur on live specimens. This includes sponges, macro and microalgae, and all sorts of other things. AS an experiment, we treated a tank full of dry base rock with this stuff and in like a month, i was amaze at all the life that magically sprung out of this "dead" rock. If you can get soe of this and treat your tank with it and i think you will be surprised as well. Your lfs should carry it if not im sure you can order it online. Good luck an welcome!
Jon