Thank you for your reply Alex. I understand what you mean by having patience
and waiting for the rock to mature. I have had freshwater tanks for years
and waiting for a tank to cycle is common practice here. I just didn't
want to go though this process, only to find out that my rock was dead in
the first place. I know that there will be "die off" of the live rock and
then the water parameters will normaize and I'll be able to add to it. I
just don't see any difference in colors on my rock at all, except for maybe
a couple of spots that are bluish. ( a good thing).
My two Mollies that are in the tank just today had another set of live
babies, so I'm assuming that's a good sign as far as water quality ... the
first ones were removed to lessen the bio-load on the tank, and these ones
are going in my hospital tank to be given away later.
Alex, would it be alright for me to send you a very high quality picture
of the rock to get your opinion? I am just remembering reading that I should
NOT have the lights on while cycling the tank, but I'm going to read up on
that after posting this message here. The reason I say this is I think there
is a light coating of algae forming on the live rock ... and for all I know
... this might be bad by not allowing the coraline to grow.
By the way, the tank has been running with mollies in it for three
months before introducing the live rock. I have been monitoring my water
parameters closely and everything seems fine, but it's hard to get real help
from the LFS because they refuse to accept that fact that a nano tank can be
set up and run with a "noobie" in charge, but I have this tank beside my
computer desk in the rec room where the whole family spends most of their
time... so I'm always on top of the tank checking and testing.
Anyway .. sending you or anybody who reads this a 5 meg dig pic would
put my mind at ease as to weather I have purchased good rock or not. One
thing about this rock is .. it was on sale for 30 % off and then the guy did
not add tax to it ... so I got 10.5 pounds of rock for $85.00 Canadian. I
know that I should have at least another 5 or more pounds in there .. but I
just didn't have that much to spend.

Caper