Has anyone ever looked into live rock for an African Rift tank? After using live rock in my salt water tank and seeing the improvement in water quality, and also seeing how happy our cichlids are after we added huge pile of rubble in the tank (they stopped destroying each other), I've been wondering. I don't even know what type of rock is found in the rift lakes, but the CaCO3 type of rock with all the holes and tunnels you get for reef tanks would look nice, help stablize hardness and perhaps lower nitrate levels. Of course, none of the organisms on reef rock would survive in an African tank, but maybe there are other organisms in the rift lakes? Just a thought.
African Tank - Live Rock?
- Thread starter borntoexplore
- Start date
It seems very clear to me the problem is to get live rock from the African lakes in question. I am sure that customs will never allow this - it's just asking for all types of parasites and other undesirables getting into our FRESH water supply. I guess it may have already happened anyway; but it would seem to me that the potential disasters, even in your own tank outweigh the possible slim benefits by far.
None of us would ever throw in rocks straight from a lake here in North America without cleaning them thoroughly......isn't this case exactly the same thing?
None of us would ever throw in rocks straight from a lake here in North America without cleaning them thoroughly......isn't this case exactly the same thing?
I hadn't thought about the invasive species angle - true enough. Most reef species couldn't survive elsewhere (I live near the shore, but in a cold area). But the freshwater species might be more adaptive.
I already figured the whole concept probably wasn't practical, but I still think it's a neat idea to mimic the environment the fish come out of. I've read that Cichlids hang out in rocky areas where they like to pick at the rock and hide in it. I think if you have a Cichlid tank without a big jumble of rock you're not getting to really appreciate how good they are at hiding and swimming around in the jumble. But the rock I have in there isn't very porous, so it's displacing a lot of water. And it's not as attractive as the reef rock I have that is placed to make a naturally looking wall of rock.
The plants are a good idea for water quality - our problem is the nitrates so that would really help.
I already figured the whole concept probably wasn't practical, but I still think it's a neat idea to mimic the environment the fish come out of. I've read that Cichlids hang out in rocky areas where they like to pick at the rock and hide in it. I think if you have a Cichlid tank without a big jumble of rock you're not getting to really appreciate how good they are at hiding and swimming around in the jumble. But the rock I have in there isn't very porous, so it's displacing a lot of water. And it's not as attractive as the reef rock I have that is placed to make a naturally looking wall of rock.
The plants are a good idea for water quality - our problem is the nitrates so that would really help.
Sounds like they act much like Bass - which isn't suprising, since they look about the same too. Probably not very far off rom each other in evolution.
The thing that bugs me is beautiful fish that spend most of their time hiding from view. But I suppose that if you have a bunch of territorial fish, it can't hurt ot have hiding places for them.
The thing that bugs me is beautiful fish that spend most of their time hiding from view. But I suppose that if you have a bunch of territorial fish, it can't hurt ot have hiding places for them.
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