Man Made Live Rock poll?
 

Would you ever put Man made live rock in your tank if it was fully cured and cheeper then what your buying now?

Tell me why you wouldn't!

and/or

Tell me why you would!

Is there much of a diff. Between the two.

I vote NO
Would you put an imitation fish in your tank?

I have doubts about the porosity and genuine appearance of man-made rock. I only buy rock once I prefer to have real rock.

I dont have any man made live rock in my tank or have I had any experience with it. However if it served the same purpose of housing bacteria just as well as the real stuff but at a cheaper price I would use it. Eventually it would get covered in coraline and noone would know the difference. I'd probably mix it in with some real stuff if it didn't look that great but if it was easy to stack and aquascape with I wouldn't be against using it.

I made some 2 months ago... tried to make it pretty b ut its still ugly.. and heavier than what i was planing. and the ph still has not stabilized.

i think if it ever stabilizes it will go in my sump but for the DT i vote real thing only.

I feel the same way as you blacknife. I actually looked into this two months ago. I just thought I would end up with a bunch of different looking / styles of rocks. I was also worried about the longterm effects of the cement in my tank.

I feel that they have their uses. I have a bunch of cement in my tank. I have made some man made rock for the purposes of hiding large "Y' fittings and nozzles in my aquarium. I feel that it looks more natural than seeing piping in the aquarium. Many people that have come over and have seen the rock in person has been fairly impressed as you can't tell the difference once you have the variety of stuff grown and living on it. I have seen no negative effects in 15 months. After all, frag plugs are man made rock. They have all been encrusted over and hidden not in my aquarium.

I will go with Dez on this I never even noticed his mad made rock in his tank he did a great job of it. As for the frag plugs I make all my own plugs now. The only thing to worry about is phosphates leaching out.

Mine might look ok once i get it in the tank but i change the water in the bucket of rocks every few days and the ph is off the chart on my hot tub test strips im using... although it has started to slow down.

I am sure most of the commercial products come pre-cured. I would also consider trying again but with perlite in the mix as well to increase the porosity and lighten it up a bit.

And dez's outputs do look pretty natural.

I was mostly referring to a tank full of the stuff. I think Dez mostly has live rock and just made some fancy cement covers for his closed loop. His was very well done and yes his tank looks incredible.