Boiling Driftwood?

[thresholdoftime]

A friend of mine just gave me two nice pieces of driftwood. They were sitting outside in her garden and she said her son once used them for his fish tank. I was wondering if I should boil them in order to get rid of any parasites or actual bugs that I can see living inside of them.... She also gave me a whole bunch of shells and rocks too, so I was also wondering if boiling would be the answer to that also. Also, my brother just got back from Florida with a whole bunch of shells off the beach and I'm wondering if boiling would be the answer to that too..... lol I'm sorry for saying boiling so much but I can remember reading somewhere about how someone was ranting about how its better to boil things you put into your tank rather than treating them with chemicals.

Oh and if I do need to boil them, how long? From what I can remember reading, I thought they were saying something like letting them soak in Aquasafe or something to treat the chlorine after.

 

[Yellow Eye Tang]

Just boil each piece if you can for about 5 minutes... with shells I had a bad experiance with a piece I had bought that was coated with lacquer and it slowly came off killing one of my anemonies. If you boil the driftwood for a few minutes it should be fine. Of course, watch the temp before putting it in the tank. You said your driftwood was in her garden? Make sure that there was no fertilizers that may have seeped into the wood. That would be bad. I'm not sure if even boiling that would work.

 

[joy13]

If you are going to use the driftwood boil it in case some little creepy crawlies made a home there. The shells will effect your water. The rocks can effect the quality of water as well to test the rocks put vinegar on them and if they bubble they shouldn't be used. Muriatic acid can also be used to test the rocks.

The longer you boil the wood the faster it should sink.

 

[thresholdoftime]

I'm pretty sure she didn't use fertilizers. I'm gunna try to find out for sure though. Thanks for the heads up.

About the rocks and shells though...are you saying I should't boil them or what? they are natural shells from the ocean with no enamel on them, but they were also sitting outside so I need to get all the bugs off em too.

I herd the thing with vinegar before too, but if it does'nt fizz or bubble or whatever then should I just rinse it a little and pop it right in the tank. Or should I presume by boiling?

 

[joy13]

The shells will change the ph in your tank. If the rock fizzes then don't use it. I rinse my rocks off with boiling water.

 

[thresholdoftime]

so would that put the ph up or down? I'm guessing up if they come from the ocean... would boiling them prevent them from changing the ph so much?

 

[joy13]

Shells make the ph go up, boiling them won't help, they leach very slowly.

 

[thresholdoftime]

ehhh I guess I'm gunna wait until I change to African Cichlids then, thanks.
my water is already 7.5

 

[Kar_Wash]

Boil. Boil. and Boil that driftwood. I couldnt boil my driftwood enough. I have read to boil it anywhere from 25 minutes to 10 hours. For one whole week i boilded a medium size peace of driftwood, and it still didnt sink, and still released a major amount of tannins in the water.
Soak the wood in a container of water and change water daily, and every day take it in and boil it for as long as you can.
After you keep changing the water in the cotainer outside, whenever the water stops turning brown its ready.

 

[thresholdoftime]

eh I'm actually having second thoughts about even putting the driftwood in my tank at all.... I like the crystal clear water I have in there right now.

 

[WhiteDevil]

Kar, are you sure you didnt have MOPANI driftwood?

Mopani leaches tannins like crazy, I soaked mine in a 55 gallon recirculating drum for 2 weeks with water supplied by a hot water heater and then just soaked it for 2 days then soaked in in cool water from the hose for 24 hours the water was clear, put it in the tank, once the bacteria got ahold of it it started leeching again.

before mopani addition



after mopani

actual driftwood itself shouldn't leach tannins like this I have maple wood soaking right now and its in a kids round plastic pool and its a tiny tiny bit yellow tinged but thats been it and I cut then dead branch off on Sunday morning and started soaking it immediately.


all those fish are in a 55 gallon now. No mopani.

 

[jsoong]

I'm pretty sure she didn't use fertilizers. I'm gunna try to find out for sure though. Thanks for the heads up.

Also check that no pesticide or herbicides were used. These will kill! <There was a post a while back of some wasp killer residue that killed fish in a pond even after sitting out for a couple years.>

 

[bmg07]

keep boiling the drift wood until the water stops turning brown.or until it sinks. im not sure about the shells

 

[thresholdoftime]

keep boiling the drift wood until the water stops turning brown.or until it sinks. im not sure about the shells

yeah I'm pretty sure i'm not going to use them now...so I have two pretty large pieces. Maybe I can do a trade in for some Cichlids somehow. I definlatly wanna put the shells in.. How do I know if they dont have that enamel stuff on them. I just bought a bunch from a thrift store but I dont know if they have it on em or not. They were in a section by some other pet stuff. What about petosky stones? I have a bunch of those and I put some vinegar on one yesterday and it didn't fiz or anything.