Rocks in an aquarium...

scrub them in plain water, then pour vineagar over them, if it foams you can not use it. if it doesn't rinse let dry and add to tank...good luck!
 
For rocks you can also stop by your local landscaper or quarry stone seller. You can get rocks for much less than the LFS and get a much broader choice of rocks. Also, for cleaning, I prefer to soak in bleach as there are some types of rocks that can apparently explode in boiling water and I just won't take the risk even though it is minimal. I soak and scrub in a bucket of bleach, then rinse and soak in a bucket with a triple or so dose of dechlorinator. Last thing to be careful of is not to let the rocks put pressure points on the glass of your aquarium. You can put a piece of 1/4" plexiglass from the local hardware store on the bottom of the tank to place the rocks on to prevent and pressure points.

Also, vinegar is not be a strong enough acid to alert you if a rock might degrade in the water. I believe it is actually the solution #1 from the Aquarium Pharmaceuticals NITRATE test kit that is the correct acid to test the rocks with.

I have rocks I gathered and bought in my 75 G and have followed all of the above and it worked perfectly.

http://s88.photobucket.com/albums/k...urrent=318da470.jpg&refPage=&imgAnch=imgAnch7
 
I read this somewhere when I was setting up my marine tank two years ago - if you take the rocks out of a body of fresh water - river, lake, stream, etc, you can put it in your fresh water tank.
 
You should still boil it, or scrub with dilute bleach, to kill off any nasties from the body of water.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
AquariaCentral.com
Top Bottom