stinky rocks
- Thread starter jcarroll
- Start date
moby
Member
Is the rock in your tank?
Whether you know it or not you are "curing" it due to the die off from the rock being in storage for so long. Essentially you are starting over. The smell is hydrogen sulfide gas. This is a bi-product of the curing process. Perfectly normal.
Keep the rock in a venilated place and treat it as you would for a new batch that needs to be cured.
Moby
Whether you know it or not you are "curing" it due to the die off from the rock being in storage for so long. Essentially you are starting over. The smell is hydrogen sulfide gas. This is a bi-product of the curing process. Perfectly normal.
Keep the rock in a venilated place and treat it as you would for a new batch that needs to be cured.
Moby
moby
Member
I'm hoping that the sand and the rocks will spike a cycle for me
It will. The rock and sand should be rinsed well with fresh salt water and scrub any crud off.
You can then set it up in your tank, but the smell will probably persist for a while only not quite as bad.
After about 4 to 5 days if the ammonia has not risen, drop in a raw cocktail shrimp to start it off. This will may not be necessary though.
I saw your other thread, hope this answers some of your other questions.
Moby
It will. The rock and sand should be rinsed well with fresh salt water and scrub any crud off.
You can then set it up in your tank, but the smell will probably persist for a while only not quite as bad.
After about 4 to 5 days if the ammonia has not risen, drop in a raw cocktail shrimp to start it off. This will may not be necessary though.
I saw your other thread, hope this answers some of your other questions.
Moby
jcarroll
Member
Thanks for your help. The rocks are so nasty looking. I took them out, rinsed them off and scrubbed them, but they are mainly black still. I went ahead and put them into the tank with the water and sand and have two powerheads running to aerate the salt. What can I expect with the rocks, do you think? Is it something that may come clean with my clean up crew if I get a really good one? Or is something that is going to be trial and error and may need to just be taken out?
moby
Member
Hard to say what the outcome will be honestly. :thinking:
The chances of that rock still being any good is fair. But this of course depends on how and what duration it was stored.
I would monitor the water very closely. A lot of times rock will have black patches on it, but I have never seen any that was coated entirely black.
Keep us posted, I guess this will be an interesting experiment.
My gut feeling tells me this will basically be base rock when all is said and done.
Good luck.
Moby
The chances of that rock still being any good is fair. But this of course depends on how and what duration it was stored.
I would monitor the water very closely. A lot of times rock will have black patches on it, but I have never seen any that was coated entirely black.
Keep us posted, I guess this will be an interesting experiment.
My gut feeling tells me this will basically be base rock when all is said and done.
Good luck.
Moby
jcarroll
Member
Well, don't want to jinx myself, but so far I'm amazed at how the rocks are looking. They've only been in the water now for about 5 hours and already the blackness is going away tremendously. A lot of the rocks look almost their normal color, no joke! I was pretty scared when I first took them out of the buckets. The water was black and they were COVERED with black!! I haven't started running my wet/dry yet, but am getting ready to fire it up. I bet it will make an even bigger difference.
Not bad for having them stored for 9 months so far. They were totally submerged, so maybe that was the trick. I'll keep everyone posted.
I tested my water too and so far a cycle has begun already. That sand and those rocks had to have been jam packed with ammonia though from all of the die off
Not bad for having them stored for 9 months so far. They were totally submerged, so maybe that was the trick. I'll keep everyone posted.
I tested my water too and so far a cycle has begun already. That sand and those rocks had to have been jam packed with ammonia though from all of the die off
jcarroll
Member
Thought you guys may want to know that my rock looks absolutely beautiful!!! The black is totally gone, which blows my mind because it was totally black when I first got them out of the buckets. I was really worried becasue I had about 110 pounds of rock in there that I thought may just have to be thrown out.
I'm going to buy a couple of live rocks to throw in there tomorrow and probably a raw shrimp and I think I'm good to go!
Isn't that amazing that after 9 months, the rocks have survived though? There are probably 5 or 6 of them that have a bright marroon color on them still. Does this mean they could still have some life on them?
I'm going to buy a couple of live rocks to throw in there tomorrow and probably a raw shrimp and I think I'm good to go!
Isn't that amazing that after 9 months, the rocks have survived though? There are probably 5 or 6 of them that have a bright marroon color on them still. Does this mean they could still have some life on them?