Atlantic Reef Conservation
- Thread starter k3nnyp
- Start date
I'll be interested to know how it works out. Frankly, in my 30 years of saltwater reefing, I've never known a live rock that didn't need to "cure". I'm not sure how they can make that claim because no matter if it's shipped immediately when taken from the water, it will have die off during transit. There's just no way around it and with that comes the ammonia and nitrite spikes you get with death in a tank. They claim you can go straight from box to tank but I for one wouldn't do it.
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- 418
- Reaction score
- 115
On the phone Tom was straight forward and stated that the rocks will have some die off and will loose 10-15% color per day of transit. He claimed the color will come back in a couple weeks. The amount of organics on the rock will affect how much die off and can be tailored during packaging depending on customer wants. He also mentioned there will be a mini cycle and suggested running carbon or purigen. I don't plan on rushing moving any inhabitants over until I'm confident it's all clear.
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Sent from my SM-G930V using Tapatalk
Perfect! Be sure to post pics from the first arrival through curing and tank placement.
- Messages
- 418
- Reaction score
- 115
--- Update ( Long story first, pics to follow )
I've sat on writing this for a while to see how things progress prior to commenting. Initially I was not very pleased and didn't feel the rock was up to my expectations. I didn't expect the rock to glow pink like on their website but they didn't start out with much color at all. There was some concern regarding the batch I got and a delay due to weather off the coast during harvesting. Some of this might have led to more dye off or lower quality of rock than is normal but I have no way to confirm this.
During my conversations with Tom he had offered to exchange my entire shipment and pay shipping both ways but ultimately a few factors ( one being my impatience and another scheduled to be out of town ) led me to sticking it out with what I received initially.
Timelline
3/4 - Live sand arrived and to water in tank. Two bags of Purigen added to high flow area of sump. Connected reactor with Seachem Seagel
3/13 - 100lb rock shipped ( 130lb per FedEx shipping weight )
3/15 - received rock
* A shipping error with Fedex meant I had to pick half the rock up at the FedEX location
* Rock was wrapped in a beach towel and triple bagged
* Sad but a 12-14" moray eel was in one of the boxes. Dead of course. Tom had been looking for it and still doesn't know how it got into my rock. It was harvested along with the rock and they had plans for it after they identified it in the warehouse.
* Immediately loaded the rock into the tank.
* There was a good amount of dead critters on the rock. I picked off a good number of small shrimp and crabs.
3/16 - Total Ammonia 1.2 ( Red Sea ) - Stupid me I didn't get my ammonia levels prior to adding the rock so ammonia could have been due to live sand.
3/18 - Total Ammonia 1.2 still. I swapped out my Seachem Seagel for straight carbon and left for the aiprot.
3/24 - Total Ammonia level 0.8 - Using the Free Ammonia Calculator the free ammonia ( NH3 ) was 0.0155. Added some prime and let is sit over night.
3/25 - Added some more prime. My damsel served as my guinea pig and he was thriving with all the additional room. I followed later in the day with the rest of my fish and the few corals I have. Everything looked normal and the fish continued to do well.
Fast forward to 4/6. Rocks are coloring up, still not what I was hoping for but much better IMO than if I started from dry.
Hitchhikers - This was the biggest risk IMO. Initially I only found good critters. Some very hefty bristle worms, a few sponges, some snails and tons of copepods. Then one afternoon working from my couch I heard the dreaded click of a mantis shrimp. A wasn't for sure if it was a mantis or pistol shrimp but ultimately it showed itself. After doing some research I was split on whether I wanted to try to keep him or catch him but ultimately set out to catch him due to the risk of my other inhabitants. None of the rocks he was in were available for removal. I tried a trap but it wasn't coming anywhere near it and I started to get discouraged. After a couple days he was getting brave toward me and I got *EXTREMELY* lucky. His head was sticking out of a hole in a rock and I was able to spear him with a metal skewer. Felt bad about it but at this point I had decided he had to go. I turned it into a science project with my 8 year old and we spent a good amount of time with it under the microscope.
So the story is not complete and I have mixed feelings about the rock but ultimately I am very happy with the tank at this point so I can't be too critical. I also suspect a few months from now things will only improve. I will also say that, other than Tom being very busy at times, the customer support and attempts to stand behind their product was very good.
I'll upload photos a little later when I can take time to download them from Google.
I've sat on writing this for a while to see how things progress prior to commenting. Initially I was not very pleased and didn't feel the rock was up to my expectations. I didn't expect the rock to glow pink like on their website but they didn't start out with much color at all. There was some concern regarding the batch I got and a delay due to weather off the coast during harvesting. Some of this might have led to more dye off or lower quality of rock than is normal but I have no way to confirm this.
During my conversations with Tom he had offered to exchange my entire shipment and pay shipping both ways but ultimately a few factors ( one being my impatience and another scheduled to be out of town ) led me to sticking it out with what I received initially.
Timelline
3/4 - Live sand arrived and to water in tank. Two bags of Purigen added to high flow area of sump. Connected reactor with Seachem Seagel
3/13 - 100lb rock shipped ( 130lb per FedEx shipping weight )
3/15 - received rock
* A shipping error with Fedex meant I had to pick half the rock up at the FedEX location
* Rock was wrapped in a beach towel and triple bagged
* Sad but a 12-14" moray eel was in one of the boxes. Dead of course. Tom had been looking for it and still doesn't know how it got into my rock. It was harvested along with the rock and they had plans for it after they identified it in the warehouse.
* Immediately loaded the rock into the tank.
* There was a good amount of dead critters on the rock. I picked off a good number of small shrimp and crabs.
3/16 - Total Ammonia 1.2 ( Red Sea ) - Stupid me I didn't get my ammonia levels prior to adding the rock so ammonia could have been due to live sand.
3/18 - Total Ammonia 1.2 still. I swapped out my Seachem Seagel for straight carbon and left for the aiprot.
3/24 - Total Ammonia level 0.8 - Using the Free Ammonia Calculator the free ammonia ( NH3 ) was 0.0155. Added some prime and let is sit over night.
3/25 - Added some more prime. My damsel served as my guinea pig and he was thriving with all the additional room. I followed later in the day with the rest of my fish and the few corals I have. Everything looked normal and the fish continued to do well.
Fast forward to 4/6. Rocks are coloring up, still not what I was hoping for but much better IMO than if I started from dry.
Hitchhikers - This was the biggest risk IMO. Initially I only found good critters. Some very hefty bristle worms, a few sponges, some snails and tons of copepods. Then one afternoon working from my couch I heard the dreaded click of a mantis shrimp. A wasn't for sure if it was a mantis or pistol shrimp but ultimately it showed itself. After doing some research I was split on whether I wanted to try to keep him or catch him but ultimately set out to catch him due to the risk of my other inhabitants. None of the rocks he was in were available for removal. I tried a trap but it wasn't coming anywhere near it and I started to get discouraged. After a couple days he was getting brave toward me and I got *EXTREMELY* lucky. His head was sticking out of a hole in a rock and I was able to spear him with a metal skewer. Felt bad about it but at this point I had decided he had to go. I turned it into a science project with my 8 year old and we spent a good amount of time with it under the microscope.
So the story is not complete and I have mixed feelings about the rock but ultimately I am very happy with the tank at this point so I can't be too critical. I also suspect a few months from now things will only improve. I will also say that, other than Tom being very busy at times, the customer support and attempts to stand behind their product was very good.
I'll upload photos a little later when I can take time to download them from Google.
