Can anyone ID this funky white stuff?

hootie51

AC Members
Oct 17, 2009
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Hey guys,
I have this white "mucusy" stuff that started to grow on my rocks. There is nothing in the tank as it is still cycling.

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The rocks came from my LFS. Honestly before putting them in the tank all I did was rinse them off well.
 
They were dry sitting in bins. The girl said the bins on the left were for saltwater and the bins on the right were ok for freshwater, but if it is die off I wonder if some rocks from the salt water bin got put in the freshwater bin. Should I be thinking about taking them out or will the die off just help kick start my cycle as I have not added ammonia yet or anything?
 
Could just be a bacterial bloom, which is common in cycling tanks. I would go ahead and cycle, and see what happens.
 
F/W? Looks like a Dead/Dried rock called "zebra Lace or Lace rocks" sold at lfs.
Ive seen such fungus developing on the rocks which still had dried out orangish sponges or other organisms on the rocks..

If you have no fish, i guess you can add some salt and see what happens

OR
I strongly recommed to take the rocks out and thoroughly brushed them off, maybe several times as I have done with Lace Rock to completely eradicate them.

I experienced such on many occassions only with this particular rocks usually used for Af Cichlid set up.

I can be wrong since Pics sometimes do not do justice thus use my thoughts as reference.
 
What would adding salt do?
There actually is some yellowish stuff on them that looks like it could be sponge. So if I took them out and brushed them off really well that could prevent it from coming back?
 
Most f/w fungus would not live in s/w nor vice versa. Do not add salt to tank though.
Put the rocks in separate container/bucket filled with salt water is better way to do this. However, unless organic matters are removed, fungus may/can return once rocks are returned to f/w

Like I said, depending on the amt of organic matter on the rock, it may return. I even scrubbed few times until none returned.

Were they labeled as Lace Rock?
 
They weren't labeled at all. I thought it was just base rock (not dried live rock). I really wanted river rock, but they didn't have any so I might take this stuff out and find some river stones and slate rock. Eh...what a mess.
 
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