Killing Aptasia or Sterilizing Rock

[Borderjumper]

Originally Posted by HL649

What is the best way to destroy all of the aptasia on live rock? I have an aquarium full of live rock that has a fairly heavy infestation of aptasia. I want to move the rock to my new aquarium but I don't want any aptasia in the new tank. There are some really nice big pieces so I would like to reuse it. I was considering removing each piece and boiling it in a big pot to sterilize it. I understand that it would kill all the good stuff but that is a price I am willing to pay to get rid of the aptasia.

Anyone have any better ideas?

I did a lot og googling on this last month when my tank cracked and all my live rock got "deaded". I am NOT recommending this, but I Found this thread interesting... It's about bleaching rock.

http://www.3reef.com/forums/live-roc...ock-37810.html

[apex82]

I vote to boil it... I had the same issue and as long as you have some other live rock that is healthy you can just seed it one piece at a time in the new tank. I decided it is not worth the headache and extra maintenance trying to control infestations. Maintaining the tank and livestock enough as it is, don't want to add more work if it can be avoided from the start.

I boiled mine in a 5 gallon bucket, left in fw for a day and then did another round of boiling to make sure. Make sure you do it in the garage or outside, cover your mouth with something and dont breathe it in... it will smell like something died and probably not to good for your health as well. It kept a lot of color surprisingly, but some parts are mainly white. I just started adding a rock every few days to the display tank to not cause any spikes.

[asylumdown]

hmmm, that bleach option sounds appealing for all the rock in my current system when I trade up. I wasn't sure what I was going to do with 100 pounds unusable aiptasia spawn, but that sounds like a fast way to get the rock completely clean.

I have tried boiling rock before, but only in small pieces.