Help! Tank Has Been Sitting For 7 Months..

[Sonic99]

Hey there, I have a 24g aquacube with live rock and live sand that has been sitting with the lights off and the pumps off too for about 7 months... I had my tank overheat and I lost all my corals and cleanup crew.... SO, what effect does having the live rock and sand sitting there without light for so long do? What all needs to be done to get it up and going again? I want to do a 100% water change.... What else??

Thanks guys!
-Ryan

 

[idlefingers]

Just sitting there.. for 7 months.. with water in!! I hate to think how rotten and smelly that'll be!

 

[AK77]

Errr essentially you'd have killed your LR too by leaving the pumps off. There may be some anerobic bacteria alive in there, but the nitrifying ones I would think are long dead as a result of no water flow.

You are probably going to have to start again from scratch, with new/more LR etc.

 

[Sonic99]

LOL everyone thinks it would stink but it doesnt at all! So if the LR is dead can i use it as baserock? If I add just a little more LR wont the bacteria spread and essentially make it "come back to life"? Someone else suggested I "cook" the LR..... Put it in a garbage can with no lights and a powerhead with a little extra salinity.... Has anyone heard of that???

 

[idlefingers]

I dunno.. you could find out if it has the ability to process ammonia by putting it in the tank w/ fresh water & powerheads on and add some ammonia then measure the levels and watch if/how fast it drops.

 

[pengy666]

My opinion would be to empty tank give it a good clean and start again?

I wouldnt throw the LR away? run it for a few weeks and see what happens??

What is the worst that COULD happen? You have to throw it away? I would just start again!

(dont clean LR tho just swill it in some new salt water in a container)

Thats what I would do?

 

[AK77]

You could use it as baserock. I don't see any harm in that at all. You will need to add new LR which will seed the old stuff eventually and yes it will "come back to life" after the bacteria has re-establised itself.

It probably doesn't smell in there because all the ammonia would have been consumed most likely leaving only nitrates, which would possibly also have been consumed due to the lack of water movement for de-nitrifying bacteria to establish itself.

Not heard of the "cooking" of LR myself, but I'm relatively new to marine keeping myself and so aren't aware of all the techniques. I would have thought though that the bacteria would need to be present in order to establish itself and make the rock become live again.

 

[Musho3210]

yeah i vote base rock, just get a small amount of the highest quality live rock you can find...

Cooking is a popular method of curing, its meant to cause a smaller algae bloom in the beginning of the tank since most of the algae spores and stuff should have died in the no light environment.

Give it flow and there will be bacteria, give it a very very long time and it will become.... sorta live, give it a seed and it will grow into the live rock that you had before.

 

[Sonic99]

Ok so I have the live rock sitting in a storage bin with the lid on. Fresh saltwater and a powerhead.
How long does it need to sit like that before I can put it back in the tank?
And should I get the new LR now and put it in while it cooks or wait until it goes back into the tank?

Thanks so much guys!
-Ryan

 

[Sonic99]

Found an older pic of it...

 

[AK77]

Looks cool. I like the fact that something ominous might live in the big cave in the centre lol.

With regard to the LR, you are only going to make it live again by seeding it with a piece of new LR. You can either purchase a couple of kilo's of new LR and throw that in the mix with the old LR to cook for several months or put the old and new in your display tank and use it as the base rock. The old rock will become seeded over the course of time.

Be advised though, looking at your old picture, you wouldn't have much room for new LR, so take that into account when adding livestock, as the bioload will be signifcantly lower until the new stuff seeds the old. I suppose you could hold off on fish for a while and just have corals. Then gradually introduce fish over the course of several months.

 

[Sonic99]

Yeah there isnt too much room for new rock... So you think that I need to leave the rock in the dark cooking for a few MONTHS? Someone else had suggested 2 weeks... I know its gonna take a little while to get the filtration from the LR cuz it doesnt have the bacteria yet. But how long does it have to be in the dark for?

 

[AK77]

Placing it in the dark is only suggested to get rid of unwanted algae early on. Its not really going to speed up the seeding of the old LR. Some companies that "farm" live rock from the ocean, do so by placing new rock into the ocean and leaving it for a few years before removing it for sale.

Two weeks was probably in reference to killing off unwanted algae during the "cooking" of new LR, not the seeding of old rock. It does take a long time for the bacteria to find its way into the rock and become fully established.

 

[SkiFletch]

I'd actually rinse it a LOT and then sun-bleach it if possible. The rock is totally dead, so "cooking" isn't necessary. I'd make up a couple buckets of RO water to rinse the rock in a whole bunch of times and try to get as much detritus and waste out of it as possible. Then I'd leave it out in what's left of the sunlight here in northern lattitudes for a couple days. After sun-bleaching I'd rinse a couple more times before putting it back in the tank and seeding with more live rock.

As for the sand bed, freshwater rinse that till its detritus-free. Easiest way IMO is to put it in a bowl/bucket, fill with water, stir till the detritus gets suspended, drain, repeat till clean. The sand bed prolly has black unholy nastyness in it now

 

[Sonic99]

I'd actually rinse it a LOT and then sun-bleach it if possible. The rock is totally dead, so "cooking" isn't necessary. I'd make up a couple buckets of RO water to rinse the rock in a whole bunch of times and try to get as much detritus and waste out of it as possible. Then I'd leave it out in what's left of the sunlight here in northern lattitudes for a couple days. After sun-bleaching I'd rinse a couple more times before putting it back in the tank and seeding with more live rock.

As for the sand bed, freshwater rinse that till its detritus-free. Easiest way IMO is to put it in a bowl/bucket, fill with water, stir till the detritus gets suspended, drain, repeat till clean. The sand bed prolly has black unholy nastyness in it now

Why is the rock totally dead?