# Live Rock



## chrisS (Apr 26, 2011)

Hi All,

I am buying live rock to stock my first salt water aquarium. The tank is 90 gal. I was thinking about stock with starting at 125-150 lbs of live rock. I need to be somewhat fiscally responsible here and cannot afford 180 lbs of tonga branch 

So, is there any standard rule of thumb here. I like this website because it has everything I want in one place: 
Saltwater Fish, Buy Saltwater Fish, Exotic Saltwater Fish, Large Saltwater Fish

Anybody deal with this place? I am thinking about 50 lbs of base, med-lg 50-75 lbs of premium fiji, and 25 lbs of med branch.

Open to hearing other's experiences!

Thank you,
Chris S.


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## Levi (Mar 20, 2011)

I bought 40 pounds of live rock on craigslist for 60 bucks. looks nice too. Had lots of life like pods and coral, bristle worms though I'm not a fan of those. I was able to hand pick the ones I wanted. You should look around before buying from a shop. 1-2 dollars a pound is much nicer then 4-5 a pound


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## Kaiden32 (Sep 4, 2010)

Yeah places like that are good, but if not, then what you are planning on sounds great. That might be a little much, just because tonga and fiji rock tends to be a lot less dense and will take up more room, but hey, the more rock the better. it will just help your tank be more stable.


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## verdifer (Sep 8, 2010)

I know a few places say 2lbs for every gallon but I just aim for 1lbs per gallon, I have a 50 UK Gallon tank and I have a bit over 50lbs in it, if I was to go for 2lbs per gallon I wouldn't have much room left for the fish.

Maybe aim for 1lbs per gallon with anything over that being a bonus.

I live in the UK so we don't really have Craiglist here I use Gumtree instead, but a good thing about buying second hand isn't just the price, the Rock has came from in most cases a mature tank so you get a crap load of extras like snails, Slugs etc etc, I bought 20lbs second hand a few months back and even got a couple of Hermit Crabs for free.


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## chrisS (Apr 26, 2011)

Levi said:


> I bought 40 pounds of live rock on craigslist for 60 bucks. looks nice too. Had lots of life like pods and coral, bristle worms though I'm not a fan of those. I was able to hand pick the ones I wanted. You should look around before buying from a shop. 1-2 dollars a pound is much nicer then 4-5 a pound


Yeah, good tip. I just found a guy selling 150 lbs of rock, 50 lbs of sand and some fish (including purple tang) for 350$. Its been stable for 6 years and has a really nice purple color to it.


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## Ben (Nov 6, 2010)

WARNING! Do not buy from aquaCON! Search posts here and on other forums as well as the better business bureau instead of taking my word for it. I just now got my $ back after filing a dispute w/my credit card company!


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## beaslbob (May 29, 2009)

Hopefully this will show up:

<a href="http://s492.photobucket.com/albums/rr284/beaslebob/liverocks/?action=view&current=rockssmall.jpg" target="_blank"><img src="http://i492.photobucket.com/albums/rr284/beaslebob/liverocks/rockssmall.jpg" border="0" alt="reef,tanks,aquariums,liverock"></a>

That is my source of live rock here. $20/TON.

IME you don't need live rock to maintain any aquarium (although you may want it for other reasons). 

To me what you do need is plant life like algae (macros, corraline, turf, etc) to balance out and stabilize the operation of the tank. *old dude

Those algaes are not only much more effective but much less expensive as well. Plus IMHO it is the algae on the live rock that makes live rock work.

Still just my 


.02


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## beaslbob (May 29, 2009)

in case the rock picture didn't show up it is post 18 in this thread:

http://www.aquariumforum.com/f15/beaslbob-builds-12872.html

not even worth .02


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