TO MUCH LIVE ROCK?

[mathias]

Is there such a thing as to much live rock? Just wondering because buying the stuff is a little addictive :-D :-D



And josh I kind of feel like we should just start a chat window or something lol

its alright this is very informative while I sit in my office waiting for my next customer.......

[mathias]

where do you get your life rock from??

[robertpower3]

I agree with josh. Cb pets has walt smith premium fiji for $3 something a pound. You can't beat that. I have never seemn an lfs sell live rock that cheap except maybe if it was base rock but imo walt smith fiji is as good as it gets.

[matt]

Yes, you can definitely have too much rock, and I kind of feel that most of us do. We'd be better off using less rock, and stocking our tanks as if they were a little smaller. But, the biggest problem I've encountered with too much rock is the problem in getting good flow in all areas of the tank. Especially if you have a smaller tank, it's very difficult to get good consistent flow around and behind liverock without blasting the open areas. In my nano, which was the typical box of rocks, I never got rid of the cyano problem until I took out about 30% of the rock.

[manny]

what can happen if you don't have good flow in all areas of your tank? I've noticed a few areas of my tank that don't get much flow at all. Here's a quick layout that I made up that shows possible areas of bad flow.

Powerheads are powersweep 226s.
Areas in red have very little water movement and blue is water movement from powerheads. Anything bad with this setup?

[robertpower3]

You will have dead spots and accumulation of detritus. the die off in the tank can cause problems.

[manny]

No wonder I've been gettin readings for ammonia lately. I added some live rock that I had cured and started getting readings of .25
I thought I still had die off from the live rock which I figured was kinda weird since tests from the container I had cured the rock in were reading 0 before I added it in the tank. It's gotta be my layout which is creating die off from the sand huh? This is a new problem.
I know I'm gonna have to move my rock around now so I was just wondering if anyone could give me some suggestions/tips for arranging my rock. Do you guys put your rock all the way to the back when aquascaping? I've checked out pictures all over the place but it's kinda hard to tell what the layout of a tank is by just seein the front.

[matt]

You want to make sure there is enough clearance around the rock for water to flow. It's tough in the back, especially if your returns are in the back sending water forward.

[Henry]

My possible solution to the flow behind the rocks, is a spray bar sitting just above the sandbed. this is going to be part of a closedloop. Hopefully it will work, I'll let you know.


Henry

[MikeP]

Dead spots happen in any tank - the problem is wastes will tend to accumulate in those areas and settle - without a good method of getting them back into the water column to be broken down further they just rot. Although there are some great affordable powerheads they are bulky and many add heat to the water. A closed loop is ok - not very flexible though and you need to sink money into a good external pump.

Check out this month's copy of advanced aquarist for a great DIY project from anthony calfo for making a flow manifold for your tank. Also the aforementioned spraybar is a good idea you will have to experiment a fair amount with where to place it and place the holes on the pipe for optimal flow though.

[mathias]

I got the awnser BUBBLE WALLS.... :-D

[manny]

What if you don't have a sump, which is my case? Layout is exactly like the picture I made.

Oh yeah, I have 12 mexican turbos, 6 astrea, 6 cerith, and a serpent star that is about a foot across. Also have a sand sifting star that hangs out in the front part of the tank. Yesterday I noticed about 4 of the turbos eating up the detritus on one side of the tank. You think having this clean up crew will keep my tank clean enough and avoid any problems where the sand's not getting much flow?

[matt]

Actually, your starfish will certainly eat any and every sandbed animal you put in there. Shimek calls them "sand bed destroyers" In terms of waste removal, I'd get rid of those, and consider an urchin, assorted snails, and maybe one or two hermits. Then your sand bed can get populated with detrivores like worms. Sorry!

[manny]

Actually, your starfish will certainly eat any and every sandbed animal you put in there.

What sandbed animals are you referring to?
Plus, what are everyone elses opinions on starfish?
I also forgot to mention that I have two scarlet crabs. Don't really like crabs since they'll eat snails for their shells so I've stuck mainly with snails.

[Jimnorris]

I do not think there is a thing as to much liverock! I think there is a thing of having not enough water in the tank????? Of course I am a guy speaking who has about 600 lbs of liverock in his tank.
Jim

[robertpower3]

I'm with Jim on the live rock issue. I have $160lbs in my eight gallon.

[manny]

Well, guess I'll be putting up a sifting star for sale soon.
For anyone else wondering about the star problem matt is referring to here's a good website I found.
http://www.rshimek.com/reef/sediment.htm