Rock testing

[DioAquatics]

I found some rocks at the park near my house that I'd like to use to scape my 55g. Ive heard that you can use vinegar to see if it fizzes or not, than it should be safe for the tank. I also saw on youtube that using muriatic acid will get a better reaction. Has anyone ever used it to test out their rocks? If I post a picture of the rocks I found, would anyone be able to tell me if they're safe to put in my tank?

 

[Dovah]

Good afternoon! It wouldn't hurt to post a picture. I've heard of the vinegar test as well but never actually tried it.

 

[DioAquatics]

I'll post a picture when I get home

 

[TikiBird]

I've used muriatic acid. It's easy to find at a hardware store and cheap. Gave me peace of mind to test my rocks before putting them in my tanks.

 

[qchris87]

It's always good to boil them before placing them in the tank. After your test of course.

 

[DioAquatics]

TikiBird yea I found the muriatic acid at my local Home Depot. Going to buy it this weekend and test the rocks I found.
qchris87 I heard that I should just pour boiling water on the rocks and shouldn't boil them because they can like explode or shatter or something like that, is that true?

 

[qchris87]

I have heard that too. I believe its due to water that is trapped in the rock causing it to shatter in high heat. I've personally never had it happen. But I dip the rocks for 30 seconds.

I've also heard people bake rocks, the pour boiling water over it like you said, hydrogen peroxide and sun drying is probably safest.

Edit: I'm not suggesting you bake the rock. I've actually seen rocks explode in camp fires where temp. is way higher than boiling water. That heat causes pressure to build up in a rock if it has a cavity in side of it causing it to rupture.

 

[Plecomaker]

I dry then pour boiling water then dry. I don't see any advantage in sitting them inboiling water.
everything that's going to die will in the first few seconds.

I also don't use anything with a metallic streak and I vinegar test.

 

[DioAquatics]

So the best method would be to dip the rocks into to boiling water for short periods of time?

Fishlore won't let me upload the pictures with my iPad because they're too big. How do I resize them?

 

[qchris87]

Pouring boiling water like what Plecomaker does would work as well.

 

[DioAquatics]

So pouring the boiling water is the way to go

edit: I'll be posting pictures of the rocks tomorrow when I can resize them on my computer since it won't work on my iPad

 

[DioAquatics]

So here are some pictures of the rocks. Sorry if the pictures are flipped the wrong way, it's kind of confusing on an iPad.

All of them



Here are some close ups of just a few






I have 2 that look like this. I believe they are granite, if they are I know they're aquarium safe.

 

[DioAquatics]

Can anyone help with ID'ing these rocks?

 

[DioAquatics]

UPDATE: So I got the muriatic acid and tested the rocks, unfortunately most of them bubbled so I got rid of them. The 2 that I thought were granite did not bubble up so I kept those and went to get more of them at the park right across the street from my house. I also found what appears to be slate and I know that's safe so I might use those too. I will be cleaning them all and pour boiling water on them maybe like 5 times or so.

 

[DioAquatics]

UPDATE: so I got a huge lot of what I think are granite rocks, from my park today. I think it was a total of 26 rocks. I got some really nice pieces with a lot of colors and stripes and stuff like that. I'm going to be cleaning them really well tomorrow then I'll post a picture of them.

 

[TikiBird]

I love cool rocks!

 

[DioAquatics]

Me too! I was looking for just a few rocks but as I kept looking I kept finding rocks I liked. I'll be using some to rescape my 10 gallon male livebearer tank

 

[DioAquatics]

Finally cleaned the rocks as much as I could and poured boiling water on them about 7 times. They should be good for my tank now. Here are some pictures