River Rocks In A Reef Tank?

[markl]

i was at cbay and noticed they have a bunch of river rocks med in size in a tank. i want to grow my zoas on really smooth rocks to put on my bb tank. is there a concern with metals and other thinks in this type of rock for a reef tank?will it throw the ph off? looked like a great idea and i want have to make my own half domes .the bottom of my tank is going to be covered in zoa rocks no sand.i dont want to use lr rubble. i also thought about clam shells.

 

[liverock27]

I don't know anything about the river rocks, but why don't you just make your own reef plugs. You could make them in any size you wanted to and just leave off the stem. Here is a link that shows how to make them.

 

[markl]

i dont want plugs. im lookin to make something like the size of a racket ball or tennis ball cut in half. i will make it if i have to. i want to be able to pull it out and frag if i need. thanks for the link.

 

[johnr2604]

My concern would be that these rocks typically have veins of heavy metals. fine for fresh water but I would be concerned about an invert tank. Might be fine but you have to think about where people pan for gold (in rivers).

 

[calireefer]

Filter with carbon. Also many macro alga's will remove heavy metals so you could set up a refugium.

Without a deep sand bed or live rock I would be more concerned about lack of natural filtration.

You could overcome this problem by running a deep sand bed refugium as well as a cryptic live rock section in your sump.