Acclimating hitchhikers?

[midiman]

Assuming my LR has living hitchikers, should I:

1) toss them into my tank
2) put them in a quarantine tank
3) acclimate them slowly as if I had ordered them on purpose

There's scant info on the care and treatment of hitchhikers. What do you guys do?

Tentative LR arrival: Thursday, Feb. 3.

 

[Brad]

I think the simple answer is that you should treat the LR as if it were a fish. What would you do if you were to introduce a fish to the tank?

The trouble with LR is that it is so big that it is difficult to acclimatize as you might normally do with anything you want to live.

The thing that I think is hardest on the rock life is to put it into an uncycled tub and force it through a complete cycle. Hitchhikers will pay a high price for that. This is often called "curing" the rock, but it is mainly just cycling a tupperware tub using LR as the fuel.

So most likely the best way to keep hitchhikers alive is to get the rock straight into the most healthy environment possible...probably your tank. You can get away with this if your rock is high quality. Rock with a lot of death on it will cause your main tank quite a spike.

 

[scuba_steve]

agree 100%

 

[midiman]

Thanks. That's the first thing that sounds like it will be less work than I imagined!!!