Vendors! Take care of the live rock!!!
 

Ok, this has been a long standing complaint of mine...

Why do vendors always get in a bunch of live rock from overseas plop it in a holding tank, and not give a popcorn fart if the ammonia spikes to 4 ppm?? Why oh why do you guys do this? Most vendors don't even have a skimmer on the holding tank, some don't put a heater in it, and some use tap water!!! Like seriously Mr Vendor, don't you know you're charging a PREMIUM for this stuff which happens to be the most important filtration "device" we will invest in often spending more money on rock than our skimmer, and you're not taking any procedures to promote a HEALTHY, LIVELY, CLEAN rock??

One day, I'm going to have my own store...things will be different!!!! :lol:

Come into Homes Alive in Lethbridge. Our rock tank is actually on old koi holding tank complete with internal sump, Protien skimmer, UV filter, heater and has T5HO lighting over it.

I find now a days vendors are charging premium prices for not so premium base rock while here on canreef you can find nice rock for half the cost. I dont complain much because I just buy it off other people. My last batch was 200 pounds I beleive from G1Gy and it was awesome. Loaded with crabs, snails, mushrooms, and zoanthids, that was real "Live Rock".

Ya, I buy all my live rock "used" too. I find as long as you know what you're looking for (and what you're NOT looking for!!) you can find MUUUUUCH higher quality rock for WAAAAY cheaper from established reefs.

If all else fails, I try to get the live rock right as they are unpacking it so it won't be subjected to the horrible confines of the polluted holding tank.

Its too bad you wernt closer you could come look at our stuff. Like I said we run it just like any other tank, skimmer uv. We have a few spares in the back room we are thinking of using as curing tubs then move the cured stuff onto the floor when its ready.

Not ALL vendors do that, I can attest to that and any of my customers will also agree as 90% of all the rock in the store is fair game to the customers. I can speak the same of some of the other LPS in the area.


I have seen the large holding tanks full of rock also like all of you.

That is why we try to keep our rock nice and healthy. Actually most of ours will be cured and clean when it is ready for sale. We have ours mainly in with the systems where we have our acclimized fish in.

We have 2 120 gal tanks with skimmers and heaters taking care of the "New" rock where we can actually cure them before they are introduced into our marine population.

Ken - BWA

Myka;
In all fairness your statement linking all vendors is like my saying
" All girls from Saskatoon make general assumptions" (which is not true).
You would not be taken as ASSUMING if you stated " A vendor I visited in Calgary , or Regina, or Saskatoon did etc., etc.

I do now agree all sellers of live rock should thrive to keep it in an environment that allows beneficial bacteria, pods, etc. to thrive. That said heaters, skimmers, and clean water are an essential.
One thing I do not agree with is Lighting on LR for resale in my care. My goal is to sell live rock that adds benefit to your tank immediately without adding ammonia. All die off will have already been processed. General fish systems with new fish arrivals is NOT a good place to store LR for customer sales.

And then you will get a chance to defend yourself from people that will link you with general accusations.

Thanks Myka Live Rock is such an import part of our systems and more care (even on my part) should be taken to ensure we utilize this limited resource to its fullest.

Kevin

^^ reasons why red coral is one of the best shops in town!

I do Agree with Myka. those people just starting out in the saltwater game get hosed by vendors that treat their rock in the manner suggested above. i remember when i started i bought mine from one of the chain stores. It came with no life, no algae, possibly no bacteria. With the knowledge i have now i feel very cheated by the whole experience

Let me guess, best products, best staff and lowest prices?? Now that's funny :lol: Good luck with that!

All businesses have overhead, and in order to compete in the market a business owner must reduce this overhead in ways he or she sees fit. Most will do this by focuses more certain products and not so much on others (specialization). Now a days you won't find a store that's the best at everything. In my mind I don't see a lot money making potential in live rock so why focus on that? Plus 95% of people don't care.

On a second note I see very little importance on having a skimmer on a live rock holding tank. Clean and warm saltwater is the only real requirement. If you keep volume small it's probably better to simply change the water completely every so often using discarded water from other systems.

I see very little benefit in anonymously cutting down vendors. It's pretty easy to sit back and complain about what others do yet what exactly have you done? You should open a store, I'm not sure why I didn't think of that myself, all you need is the highest overhead and lowest prices, it's so obvious :wink:

Kevin I wish more stores had your attitude for rock.. lighting is definatly not a good thing in new rock and should only be added well after all the algae and plants are gone. I know some people seam to like the leaf algae on there rock but personaly when I buy rock I want it clean with lots of bugs and a coraline, no mushrooms, ext.. and I donot believe it should be in tanks with fish at all, some places use tangs to hide algae on rocks.. the tangs keep it looking clean but the algar roots are there and when you get it home it goes nuts.

I think my ideal rock system would be three seperat systems. rock would come in to store and go to a back room system not available for sale. this system would be heated, tones of water flow and have major skimming but be in total darkness. I would probably leave it in this system for 2 months. from here it would go into a system with the same equipment but lit by actinic lighting only for another month and then finaly into the sale tanks. but I know this isn't reasonable for a lot of stores as they have to justify the cost per square foot and arn't willing to invest say 2 to 3K in rock they won't be able to sell for 3 months or even lay out the money to set up 3 different systems for one purpose.

Steve

It is very important.. if you have a good skimmer on your rock curing tank the vendor can save a lot of money in waterchanges and it is more efficent than doing the waterchanges also as it is continuiously removing the "crap" where the waterchanges will let the levels build up then gone. also there is a much higher survival rate for bugs when you use a skimmer as there is less shock to them due to waterchanges and less spiking of amonia, nitrate and nitrite. Just like in our tanks the more stable the better and the common problem is that people see rock as a decoration not as one of the most important biological additions to our tank.

It is attitiudes and lack of education in a lot of LFS' that cause this thinking and it is realy sad that people will spend thousands on corals and fish, but yet will find the most used oldest rock they can and just throw it in there. old rock is exactly that old rock.. it isn't wine it doesn't get better with age. its ability to filter and help to prevent algae declines with age.. it cazn be rejuvinated but this requires a lot of time and work and is called "cooking" the rock. I would never add rock to my system that has been in some one elses tank for a long time with out cooking it first.

Steve