Whats that smell?- Cooking live rock

[Sir Patrick]

I think I have just encountered the worst smell ever! No exageration!

I have a tub in the basment with about 150lbs. of live rock "cooking" in the basment. The rock came out of a neglected 12 year old tank. Rocks were full of algea.......and giant fire worms!

I will never put off the first water change on a liverock cooking for a week and a half again!!My whole house stinks like a sewer exploded. There must have been 100 giant rotting fireworms at the bottom of the bin, most 1/2" wide. No clue how long they could have been, being shriveled up.

Word to the wise- Change that water every 3 days (at least) for the first couple weeks of cooking. You have no idea how bad it smells in my house right now!

[ReeferRob]

Sorry to hear that buddy.

Whats your method of cooking anyway? Im guessing no light and heavy flow but what temp?

[Sir Patrick]

No light and surface agitation. Doing it cold to kill off all mojanos and aptasia. I will warm it up for the last 3 weeks of cooking. No light and 100% water changes twice a week with a rinsing of the rock with each water change.

I didnt forsee the problem of waiting a while on the first water change. The rock bin is in my walkout basment, and can barely breath in the main floor of the house. Fingers crossed the smell will be gone tomorow.

The wife is not happy.......shes saying it comes close to the time the tank caught fire in our old apartment in the middle of the night.....stinks that bad.

[Sir Patrick]

Temp is aroung 60 degrees.

[Sir Patrick]

Gonna toss in the towel on the rock cooking.....

I cant (or should I say my wife cant) take the whole house stinking up with ever water change any longer. The smell has gotten less offensive with each water change, but still reeks. Its too bad too. It is over 200 lbs of live rock!

Gonna have to bleach it and dry it out.....this stinks- in more ways than one...:duh:

[MizTanks]

Couldn't ya just cook it in an oven? Small bits at a time? This is what I've always done with my rocks for FW.

[Sir Patrick]

I used seant's method from this thread, but should have followed it closer...

http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=1478334&highlight=Rock+Cooking

[MizTanks]

Threads gone....

[Sir Patrick]

Acual cooking in an oven will kill the rock. This method of "cooking" will make the rock live, and ready to do (denitification) whats its supposed to do very well.

[Sir Patrick]

Sure is gone, I can copy and paste.

[Sir Patrick]

Taken from reef central, posted by seant- gotta give credit for the write up. I just copied and pasted-

Here you go:

The purpose of "cooking" your rocks is to have the bacteria consume all (or as much) organic material and PO4 stored on, and in, the rock as possible.

The new environment you are creating for your rock is to take it from an algal driven to a bacterial driven system.
In order to do this, the rock needs to be in total darkness to retard and eventually kill the algae's on the rock and to give the bacteria time to do the job.

So basically you need tubs to hold the rock.

Equipment needed.
1. Dedication.
2. Tubs to cook rock in. And an equal amount of tubs to hold the rock during waterchanges.
3. A few powerheads.
4. Plenty of buckets.
5. A smug feeling of superiority that you are taking it to "the next level."
6. Saltwater, enough made up to follow the instructions below and to replenish your tank after removing rocks.
Here are the steps:

1. Get into your head and accept the fact you will be making lots of salt water if you aren't lucky enough to have access to filtered NSW.
2. Explain to significant other what is going on so they don't flip out. This process can take up to 2 months. Prepare them in advance so he/she can mark it on the calendar and that they won't nag about it until that date arrives.
3. Setup a tub(s) where the rock is to be cooked. Garages are great for this.
4. Make up enough water to fill tub(s) about halfway and around 5-7 buckets about 60% full.
5. Remove all the rock you want to cook at this stage. (The rock can be removed piece by piece until you are done.) I suggest shutting off the circulation beforehand to minimize dust storms.
6. Take the first piece of rock and dunk it, swish it, very, very well in the first bucket. Then do it again in the 2nd bucket, then the third.
7. Place rock in the tub.
8. Repeat steps 6 & 7 to every piece of rock you want to cook at this time. The reason I suggested 5-7 buckets of water will be evident quickly...as the water quickly turns brown.
9. Place powerhead(s) in the tub and plug in. Position at least one powerhead so that it agitates the surface of the water pretty well. This is to keep the water oxygenated. You can use an air pump for additional oxygenation if you wish. Only one powerhead per tub is needed. Remember the powerheads main responsibility is the oxygenation of the water.
10. Cover the tub. Remember, we want TOTAL darkness.
11. Empty out buckets, restart circulation on main tank.
12. Wait.
13. During the first couple of weeks it is recommended to do a swishing and dunking of the rocks twice a week.
What this entails is to make up enough water to fill up those buckets and the tub the rock is in.
First, lay out your empty tub(s) and fill buckets the same as before.
Then, uncover tub with the rock in it. Take a rock and swish it in the tub it's in to knock any easy to get off junk.
Then, swish it thru the 3 buckets again, and place in the empty tub..
Repeat for all your rocks.
Then empty the tub that all the rocks were cooking in, take it outside and rinse it out with a hose.
Place tub back where it was, fill with new saltwater, add rocks and powerheads, and cover.
Wait again until the next water change.
You will be utterly amazed at how much sand, silt, detritus is at the bottom of the tub and every bucket. It is amazing.
At times the stench was so strong I gagged.

How it works:

Some FAQ's.
When re-introducing the rock to my tank, a month or two from now, should I do that in parts to help minimize any cycling effect(s)...if there are any?
I never have. Really after a very short while, the ammonium cycle has been established. That's not what you're worry about though, it's the stored phosphates and that you have to wait it out.
When they are producing very little detritus - you'll know - then I would use them all at once.

Would running Carbon filtration and/or a PO4 reducing media help/hurry/hinder the process?
I wouldn't fool with it. You don't want the detritus to sit there long enough to rot, release water soluble P again. You want to take it out while it's still locked up in that bacterial detritus.

And a few last minute tidbits I remembered.
Your coralline will die back, recede etc.
My thoughts on this are GREAT!
Now my rock is more porous for additional pods, mysids, worms etc.
Coralline will grow back.
Throughout this process the sponges, and pods on my rock have not died off.
Every time I do a water change they are there and plentiful.

[Sir Patrick]

Well, I think I found another reason my cooking went foul....I had no water circulation in the tub....think this was an important step. Next time around, I will also keep the water heated (like I did last time) to keep the critters in the rock from dieing off and poluting the whole process.

I found that the stinkiest rock was at the bottom of the tub, and the rocks on top werent that bad. The rocks on the bottom also turned black! Smelled like rotted eggs! Those rocks will be bleached, then declorinated, then soaked in vinigar, rinced and dried.

The other 100 lbs or so went into a temporary setup tank in the basment. I have mass amounts of carbon and po4 reducers running along with a skimmer on the tank. A heater will be added shortly. Hope to save what I can. Pretty sure it will be fine. Gonna maintaine lage water changes on the tank and see how it goes. Also still keeping this tank in complete darkness.

Pretty sure everything will work out for this rock. Just ran into a major set back. As usual- I sped throuh the instructions, and missed an important step. From now on I plan on not making these kind of mistakes again!

PS- My wife is very happy- no longer the risk of the dreded "rotten death egg" smell in the house! At least I hope not!

[Viva'sReef]

Lol I just read thru this and laughed because I started cooking about 190 lbs 3 weeks ago. The first week went by and everything was fine. Then one day last week I get home and had my sister and brother in law over. As soon as we walked in the whole house had a stench of rotten eggs. I had forgot the first water change. Wow what a smell. And when I removed the lid to the bin...OMG I actually vomited it was so bad. I quickly changed out the water having a ready 30g of water made up thankfully.

I'm now doing the water changes once a week and on schedule to avoid that stench. The Rock is fine, it was all the hundreds of bristle worms and aptasia that had died off that really made the smell....I think. Lol.

I am still not heating the bin/water, but I did/do have 2 maxijets for circ and surface agitation. It's working pretty good now and the smell is pretty much all gone now after keeping up with the changes.

Not sure if it's in the directions you posted but worth noting. I just use my old water change water from my display for cooking the rock. The fresh mixed saltwater seems like it would be a waste to use to cook the rock huh?

[Sir Patrick]

Anyone else experiance anything like this, or have anything to add?

Most of the rocks are still cooking!! lol!

[gooch]

I took down a tank infested with majano's. I let that rock sit in a tub for many months with no light or water changes or heat. When I gave the rock away the first thing I was told was non of the majano's died.....lol. Of course I didn't have the crash smell like you guys had.

Hope you kill those majano's. I hate those things.

Scott

[Sir Patrick]

Figured it was time to give this thread a bump!

I too had a few mojanos survive....very surprised!

Heres a look at the rock in question, that I cooked=


http://i33.photobucket.com/albums/d87/sirpatrick1/Picture023-1.jpg




http://i33.photobucket.com/albums/d87/sirpatrick1/Picture024-1.jpg





http://i33.photobucket.com/albums/d87/sirpatrick1/Picture020-1.jpg






http://i33.photobucket.com/albums/d87/sirpatrick1/Picture021.jpg





http://i33.photobucket.com/albums/d87/sirpatrick1/Picture022-1.jpg





Just a teaser.......I finished cooking a bunck of this rock- and its on my existing tank, to this day! I did have a happy ending! More inf to follow soon.