Neptune Aquatics

Anyone use artificial reef rock aka "Real Reef Rock"? Opinions?

Enderturtle

Enderturtle

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Im planning on switching out my live rock becuse I haven't been able to shake this hair algae. Despite weekly 20-30% water changes, GFO reactor, active skimmer, chaeto, reduced feeding, huge clean up crew, and reduced photoperiod. I destroyed the hair algae with algae fx but its creeping back. If you were to measure my nitrates and phosphates they would read close to zero (hanna checker, salifert, api confirmed). Water is rodi with 0tds. There are two clownfish and a mandarin in my 40 breeder with 20 sump.

Was thinking about switching out my live rock with synthetic reef rock i.e., "real reef rock". My live rock leaching nutrients is only thing i can think of that might be fueling the growth.

What are your thoughts on the synthetic "real reef rock"?
 
Enderturtle said:
Im planning on switching out my live rock becuse I haven't been able to shake this hair algae. Despite weekly 20-30% water changes, GFO reactor, active skimmer, chaeto, reduced feeding, huge clean up crew, and reduced photoperiod. I destroyed the hair algae with algae fx but its creeping back. If you were to measure my nitrates and phosphates they would read close to zero (hanna checker, salifert, api confirmed). There are two clownfish and a mandarin in my 40 breeder.

Was thinking about switching out my live rock with synthetic reef rock i.e., "real reef rock". My live rock leaching nutrients is only thing i can think of that might be fueling the growth.

What are your thoughts on the synthetic "real reef rock"?
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Unless your PH is super low, it's unlikely that the calcium in the rock is dissolving enough to leach phosphates into the water column from the rock itself. Any organic matter that is on the surface of the rock would have deteriorated and leached all the phosphates in a few days or weeks at most. I'd question whether the live rock is the problem.

Having been there with a mandarin in a smaller tank, my guess is that the hair algae is the byproduct of feeding the mandarin, especially if you are feeding multiple times a day. I think with more appropriate fish and a reduced feeding schedule, you'll find the hair algae goes away.

In the meantime, what worked for me was a few drops of lanthanum chloride once a day and an army of turbo snails (I wouldn't be shy about having 10 in your tank).
 
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All things aside, I've worked with the Real Reef rock and I am a big fan. The new generation of their rock is actually pretty amazing - it is my favorite rock to work with - and I've worked with just about everything.

My guess is there other factors besides the rock in your tank - had similar problems myself, sometimes the algae seems to defy logic.
 
Save your money, but if you are inclined, I will take your old rocks with algae and all:)
Try 50 and 100 microns filters for a month, it should do the trick. For a faster result, dip it in H2O2 for a few minutes.
 
Hmmm I could use a new aqua scape. Theres no room in my sump for a filter sock. Ill give you the live rock euod assuming no one buys it first.

See the algaefx killed all of the hair algae in my tank. Then it just slowly grew back.
 
Not to address the hair algae problem, but I figured I'd way in on the rock. I just bought ~10 lbs of the Real Reef Rock from Aquatic Collection and it seems really nice. Its very colorful, but I think it still looks realistic. They have a lot of nice shapes to choose from and its got lots of holes and crevices, so its not super dense. Its a bit pricey though at $8/lb but they discount the price the more you buy.
 
The rocks in the back in this photo are actual live rocks from the Florida Keys and the 3 rocks in the front are the new Real Reef rocks I picked up.

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I think you'd lose some of the incredible biodiversity that you get with live rock if you pulled it. I got a nasty hair algae bloom with my ocean cured live rock. Snails, skimming, manual harvesting and water changes cleaned it up over a number of months.
 
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