If you can't figure out why rock costs so much you can fly me 50 pounds at your expense. Shipping/airfreight ain't cheap.
You can use live rock to seed other rock types. I'd put lace rock near the bottom of the pile compared to 'mould your own' blobs of aragocrete (see the garf site). I don't like lace rock because I don't what it is. If it's some sort of limestone you should be fine, if it's volcanic tuff it's hello to continual algae problems. High temperature volcanic rocks aren't stable in salty water and deteriorate to leak metals and silicates(which is what they mostly are) pretty quickly.
You can use live rock to seed other rock types. I'd put lace rock near the bottom of the pile compared to 'mould your own' blobs of aragocrete (see the garf site). I don't like lace rock because I don't what it is. If it's some sort of limestone you should be fine, if it's volcanic tuff it's hello to continual algae problems. High temperature volcanic rocks aren't stable in salty water and deteriorate to leak metals and silicates(which is what they mostly are) pretty quickly.
