Making live rock stable

wcolwell88

wcolwell88

AC Members
Jun 25, 2007
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Oakland, MD./Terra Alta, WV.
www.waynecolwell.com
I'm getting ready to buy my liverock as soon as the website I'll be buying from gets a shipment of Martial Island in. I plan on having a 3" sandbed. I was wondering how everyone here makes their rock stable. I would prefer not to drill holes in it. I also would not like the rock to be glued together in case I need to remove a piece or want to rearrange it. I was reading about people putting pieces of PVC pipe under the rock to hold it up off the bottom. I've also heard some people just put base rock on the glass before they add the sand. Does anyone know of a good website to buy base rock? After I get my base rock and sand in I will probably be using Martial Island for the rest.
 
I have my rock directly on the glass bottom, then the sand built up around it. If you build it properly it's pretty stable on it's own. You could try drilling holes in the rock and putting small diameter rigid tubing in the holes to peg the rock together.
 
Marshall Island is good rock. Post pics of it when it arrives.
 
If there are no inhabitants in the tank, then adding them ammounts of live rock is fine. However, if you have fish. inverts or corals in there, only add the new rock in small ammounts, say a few lbs per week. This is to ensure that any spike from the rock being introduced is always kept at a bear minimum and reduces the ammount of stress from any elevated parameters in the tank.

Niko
 
When I built mine up, I first put in eggcrate diffuser to keep the rock off the glass bottom. It also kept the rock from sliding at all when I stacked it. I then placed the bottom layer of base rock, and then added sand all around it. That way, if fish or inverts dig around the rock, it won't collapse down because its already resting on the bottom. After that I added water and stacked the liverock. You just have to try and place it so its all locked into place and won't tip over.
 
I used to buy base rock from www.hirocks.com. This is DEAD rock but after a thorough rinsing in fresh water it does a great job. Then I added live rock on top. The life forms spread to the base rock. Hirocks sells the base rock by the box and has a number of selections for you to pick from. I always used the smaller pieces on the bottom as supports for the larger prettier pieces. I added sand after the rock was in place.

Charlie
 
atnixon said:
If there are no inhabitants in the tank, then adding them ammounts of live rock is fine. However, if you have fish. inverts or corals in there, only add the new rock in small ammounts, say a few lbs per week. This is to ensure that any spike from the rock being introduced is always kept at a bear minimum and reduces the ammount of stress from any elevated parameters in the tank.

Niko
Click to expand...

The only thing living in there right now is a couple tiny spots of algae I noticed on the bottom of the tank and a small astrea snail someone bought and threw in there. The snail stays in one spot and does not move unless I move him. After a few days I thought he must be dead, but he is still sticking to the side and when I move him he still comes out and sticks to the side of the tank. Not sure how he is living as there is no algae on the side of the tank and he never moves. I told my friend to take him back to Petco where he got him but they won't except it so he is still in there. Also, just for the record, Petco has a 15 day warranty on freshwater fish but no kind of warranty at all for anything saltwater.

I couldn't get hirocks.com but I found marcorocks.com. Looks pretty good.
 
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