Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

I actually read that to be .... "my soon FIL-to-be" .....

figured Jaymie and Axl were just getting around to formalising things

Interesting that it is" son-apostrophe-s" - Jaymie will clear it up (or clean it up)

My son is 5 1/2 years old. Last year he and his girlfriend, Amy, (also 5 1/2) decided to get married. Garion asked Amy and Amy asked Garion. They both said yes. Amy's dad is in the Army. Garion also asked him for permission to marry Amy.

Amy apparently is "the one" because she concentrates while she is driving

as good a reason as any i guess

umm what is she driving?

Kids these days...when we told my wife's parents we were getting married, her father wanted to see my bankbook to see how well off I was!

We got married anyway...

my father in law gave me a job but i dont think it was to keep an eye on me

Steve
I possibly did not explain this well. I agree the live rock is colonised by many micro organisms. its some of their deaths that initially cause the ammonia spikes (esp sponges) eg I agree with you. However once the spike is over there is a beneficial, in terms of bacterial action to the tank.

No expert myself, too expensive and fiddly. Friend of mine who used to do it as a business had seperate tanks for fish species and seperate tanks for live rock and a damned complex supply filtration system.

lol i think we're both agreeing but along two diff tracks.

i was more talking long the lines of "what will remove the nitrates from a salt water AP system"

I agree live rock contributes to the ammo / nitrite conversion.

Basically whatever is alive on the liverock is whatever you have failed to kill!
Bacteria colonise the outside and eat ammonia/nitrite and bacteria colonise the insides of liverock, some of these guys eat nitrate. Algaes will also bioaccumulate nitrates.

Because the liverock I am making from cement has no life forms on it, it is basically just filter media. No ammonia spike as no place for ammonia to come from. Once it's 'seeded' though then plenty of chances for dieoff.
luv marine tanks eh
when they work, they work so well!

Can also use deep sand beds to consume nitrates.... but ya I'b be going for algae growth... everyone luvs coraline

Don

You going to use your embed some salt crystals method in it to get texture?

Sounds like a great idea if it stops pulling live rock from the wild. hope it works out well.

I'm really interested. Take one for the team and just do it!

As for saltbush - it's an australian native (I think) that sucks up salt and excretes it from the leaves. They use it in farm areas affected by salinity to reduce the salinity. Do a quick google for it.

If you seed your live rock with some natural rock then there is no reason you won't get some nice little critters growing in there too. As long as you don't get any mantis shrimp.... lol. They are really cool little critters but they can be deadly to your fish or even your glass fish tank. You can hear them clicking during the night....

mantis shrimp are evil little critters...cool looking though, i'd keep one is a separate tank..

as far as live rock, it has to be cycled and have regular water changes in order to remove any of the dead or dying organisms. the ammonia and nitrates will spike and then drop to 0 ppm.

the live rock contains coralline algae and is very porous witch gives it a large surface area and it's loaded with both aerobic and anaerobic nitrifying bacteria required for the nitrogen cycle that processes waste. since the rock is made up of mostly coral skeletons it also stabilizes the PH of the water by releasing calcium.

I ran a reef system using only live rock as along with a protein skimmer as the filtration system and it was by far the best, most stable system I ever had..consistent tests results of >0 ppm, ammonia and nitrates
combine the live rock with some metal halide lights and the coralline algae will grow like mad.

I would make some of the concrete stuff for personal use but growing it for sale would be expensive and ALOT of work and unless you have a huge area you can dedicate to growing it wouldnt be worth the trouble


heres some info from a company here in florida and what they had to go through to start the business http://www.tampabaysaltwater.com/about/tbs2.html

ive seen a highspeed film clip of a mantis shrimp destroying a hermit crab i think...................unreal.

Yep mantis shrimp are great.
Good fun and games, and game enuf to give ockys a bit of stick!
I have already made a lot of this cement rock, and used it in a lot of fish tanks fresh and marine.
Because you mold the rocks in a bed of salt they all have the rough textured look on outside unless ya smooth them out.
The real value is in the 2/3 that is air. Thats more surface area than most LR I have ever bought, and also less water displaced.
As to it being hard to break into the market, I already found that one out the hard way. Thats why I make stuff I want, or do custom stuff for other people but don't do ten thousand bristlenose caves every arvo
Still tho, coraline algae is some good stuff and makes all the differnce making cement look like coral