I soaked mine in my bathtub for a day. I would recommend it because the water is like yellow are its soaked in there for like 24 hours. Also there shouldn't be any organism in it(I think) at least there weren't any in mine?
I think that its easier to just leave it in the tank. But if your just using it for decoration and want your tank to look nice I think you should put it in the tub and fill your tub with really really hot water, go to sleep and take it out of the tub the next morning and stick it in your tank. But as Paul_MTS said that its a waste of money and time to do that whole process it looks more natural if your tank just turns yellow for a week+.
im soaking mine in hot bath water, and changing the water each day. When the water stops going murky, then i'll put it in the tank. 3rd lot of water last night, and looking better already this morning.
i borrowed a 100G bucket (more of a water tight trolly) from the farm next door and left it to soak for a week. worked fine, bath tub would do the same thing.
if you are in no rush to get it into your tank, then you can leave it outside, we bought some massive bits for our new tank, they have been sitting in the garden for the last month and a half, the rain leaches all the tannins out, and both peices are almost white now. we just threw a kettle of boiling water over it about once a week.
when you are ready to put it into your tank you can either jet wash it, or just give it a really good hard scrub!!
this is more effective than boiling it!
yea but could you imagine bringing home a big soggy dripping bit of wood!!! in your car and imagine the smell after you take the wood out of the car.. damp and fishy