Live Rock Quality

[coym]

I am trying to understand what criteria to use when evaluating the different LR available on the maket, Untill recently I have assumed that high quality rock could be seen by the presence of coralline algaes , residual sponges and corals. I have been told recently that these criteria are irrelevent, that the real issue is the porisity or porisness of the rock , if the rock is riddled with interior spaces for the bacteria to reside and perform it's denitrification, then for all intent and purposes, the rock can look like concrete and be more effective than colorful more dense rock. What do the members here think of this and how do you deciede what rock to purchase? Of the named type of rock, ie, FIJI, Marshall, Vanatua ect, what do you recommend as a general rule? Thanks for your time, Terry

 

[Herefishyfishy]

Simply, the quality of the live rock is based on size, shape, color and density. You should aim for the largest most open-porous (light) reddish colored rock. Which level of these is all relative and up to personal preferences.
Small rubble has much less value as well as heavy boulders. Pale is less valuable than brightly colored. As to hitchhikers and sponges, some are good and some are not so good. Depends on your tank's age and maturity, your end goals, and how quickly and stably it was transported. As to names, most of the good stuff is from South pacific islands and those names are of the location of harvest. The different islands reefs grow different shapes more or less.

 

[SaltyTemple]

I suggest Shark Reef LR - it's fully cycled and I've loved the growth that comes in on it - 3+ years later we have a cool black sponge and some white sponge - we even got a feather duster out of it.

I never had a cycle at the beginning, never hit a spike - we couldn't believe it, but it was that good.

It is denser than tonga or those branches, so I suggest getting a combo - use this LR for the base stuff, then get some other accent pieces for depth

* only caveat is that there is a risk that you'd get a mantis or someother type of hitchhikers (we did end up with a mantis and a coral eating crab, but got them out in the end)

 

[Myteemouse]

I was eye balling a piece today that is prolly 16" across and 12"-14" high!!
Oh what a nice peice of rock!