Live rock intro??

Thanks for the advice

 

+1 I agree dry base is best for most of us and cheaper. Most live rock has been so "cured", there are no critters other than pests anyways. If you do go with LR, getting it direct from some like tbsaltwater tends to be better than most, but still can have a fair amount of pests. I would still primarily use dry rock, maybe with 5-10% LR as seed rock, but that's me.
Live Rock - Tampa Bay Saltwater Aquacultured Live Rock

 

+1 for the Dry (dead) rock! It should be as white as a ghost. Anytime I add LR to my tank I make sure it is dry rock. What part of texas are you from? I'm in the Austin area.

 

Sorry about your loss.
I think your damsel died from not having enough filtering system. In other words, he died from his own poop and pee. Lets just hope it would be the last one.

If I were you I'd get live rock(s) from your local fish store as many as you can afford. Look for something smaller since you have a relatively small 30 gallon. Its just easier to place in your tank (people call it "aquascaping"). And you should look for porous rocks, since they go by weight. Pay attention to the color of the rock too. Purplish color is the best in my opinion.

I wouldnt worry about getting dry rocks for now, since you have fish in the tank already. You can buy cheaper dry rocks later along the road, and cure it yourself in a separate rubbermaid container and put it in the main tank.

I hope it makes sense to you and just go to the fish store!

 

I used the dry base rock from carib sea and saw no cycle.

 

I'm from Houston, and my LFS is All About Fish and I can honestly say there are some heatly and happy fish, coral, and inverts there, it's really clean too

but downer is a lil pricey, $8 for 1lbs of LR

 

Clean LFS FTW!
$8/lbs is about right. Well I have paid more than double for that at our LFS since it was ultra premium and just wanted to "seed" the rest of the system. But thanks to this rock, our other rocks are getting purple!
Anyways, 2~3lbs live rock is way better than no live rock at all.

 

Yeah i made the mistake of buying 15 pounds of the stuff, right when i got into the hobby. No point in having the another person wasting there money. If it were me i would buy maybe 25 pounds of dry rock, and 5 pounds of live rock to seed it.

Worse comes to worse you can always add more rock

 

som3 reef3r That's actually what I plan on doing. I figured it would most definately be cheaper and a lil safer for my fishies! LOL all this talk about LR has me wanting to race out my door and rush to my LFS to get some, lol

 

I am familiar with All About Fish in Dallas, I guess the one in Houston is new(er). I also like Aquarium World on 290 between the beltway and 610. It's been a while since I've been down that way, but AW was really neat the last time I was there.

If you are looking at paying $8 lb for dry rock I'd say just go for some cured rock and just rush it home into your tank. In austin DR sells for about 2-2.50 lb and cured is $6-10 lb. Just my opinion.