 |
 | Home | Contact Us | FAQ | Search & Site Map | Link to Us |
 | Sign In | Join | Other 45 Sites in Network |
Pet Forum / Aquaria / Marine Reef / April 2006Tank age question.
I have seen mentioned online, specifically on wetwebmedia.com, but also in google searches, that after a certain amount of time it is a good idea to replace your live rock. Perhaps the idea being that a significant portion of the beneficial fauna and flora have died off. On the other hand, I have read frequently that a tank takes as much as a year to settle in and balance chemically. If you switched out very much of your live rock, even if it was cured, wouldn't you be upsetting the balance you worked so long to achieve? If you had a properly maintained system, with enough of a cleaner crew, couldn't you run a tank indefinitely? Thanks, Mark  SignatureNewsGuy.Com 30Gb $9.95 Carry Forward and On Demand Bandwidth If it aint broke don't fix it. Wayne Sallee Wayne's Pets Wayne@WaynesPets.com Mark Cooper wrote on 4/27/2006 8:04 PM: > I have seen mentioned online, specifically on wetwebmedia.com, > but also in google searches, that after a certain amount of [quoted text clipped - 14 lines] > Thanks, > Mark > If you had a properly maintained system, with enough of a > cleaner crew, couldn't you run a tank indefinitely? That's my belief. Methinks wetwebmedia is in the business of selling live rock and is not real scrupulous about how they go about it. There's no reason why your colonies of bacteria should die out after a few thousand generations in your tank. George Patterson Coffee is only a way of stealing time that should by rights belong to your slightly older self. > That's my belief. Methinks wetwebmedia is in the business of selling live rock > and is not real scrupulous about how they go about it. There's no reason why > your colonies of bacteria should die out after a few thousand generations in > your tank. If you think your live rocks is only inhabited by bacteria you are missing a lot in the whole picture... >> That's my belief. Methinks wetwebmedia is in the business of selling >> live rock and is not real scrupulous about how they go about it. [quoted text clipped - 3 lines] > If you think your live rocks is only inhabited by bacteria you are missing > a lot in the whole picture... No, I have a lot of other stuff living on or in mine. This is a reason to replace it every so often? George Patterson Coffee is only a way of stealing time that should by rights belong to your slightly older self. > If you had a properly maintained system, with enough of a > cleaner crew, couldn't you run a tank indefinitely? Unfortunatelly no. As you have read, populations of micro-organisms inhabiting your live rock will diminish over time. Mostly due to the lack of the environment supporting reproduction and relativelly short live span of animals living in and on the rocks... Also, many animals compete with each other for food and space, so when in the balance in the ocean, moved to a fish tank this balance is easily broken and population crashes. Our glass boxes with chopping powerheads are not well forgiving for mostly planktonic larvae... and compared to the ocean they are very poor in planktonic food. One way to replenish your live rock fauna and flora is to replace small amounts of rock at the time... Instead of replacing whole rockwork just exchange a rock or two every 6-8 months... This way you will not detroy balance but have a chance intruducing new life. Of course, here is another trouble: each addition of live rock has a potential of being a source of infestation of animals not considered beneficial, so it is kind of gamble. Is it that important that you need a new piece every 6 months ? What about Live Sand ? Garf Grunge ? What about just keeping a refugium ? There has got to be other ways to keep life going in your tank without running out and buying a piece of Dead Rock....Please say it ain't so Psz This is interesting...never thought about this.... >> If you had a properly maintained system, with enough of a cleaner crew, >> couldn't you run a tank indefinitely? [quoted text clipped - 20 lines] > live rock has a potential of being a source of infestation > of animals not considered beneficial, so it is kind of gamble. > Is it that important that you need a new piece every 6 months ? > [quoted text clipped - 7 lines] > > This is interesting...never thought about this.... If you know a way - tell me about it... I would like to know, too :-) |
Reply to this Message |
 Sign In
 Join
 My Latest Posts My Monitored Threads My Blog My Photo Gallery My Profile My Homepage Start New Thread Enable EMail Alerts Rate this Thread
|
©2009 Advenet LLC Privacy Policy - Terms of Use
This website includes both content owned or controlled by Advenet as well as content owned or controlled by third parties.