Can I Use Real Rock?

[spazzinout53]

ok so im setting up a little betta bowl an i have these 2 amazing pieces of red rock from the rocky mountains in colorado and i was wondering if i could put it in the tank, the bowl will have a little filter and live plants and gravel, the tank will be 2.5 gallons, and house one male betta

i thinlk ive heard that rock can lower ph in tanks but i did a little test last night, i put the rocks in a buket of water and no debri came off the rocks and they didnt make the water cloudy or anything, the ph at the beginning was 7.4 and afterward it was inbetween 7.4 and 7.2 so ya what do you guys think

 

[Luketendo]

Ok, first do a calcium test on the rock.

This just involves putting a little vinegar on it.
If it starts fizzing you can't use the rock.

Then you should boil it for a little while but wait for someone who knows more than me before you do this.

 

[Bignose]

Of course you can use real rock -- the fish in the wild don't have artificially colored gravel in every lake and river and stream. Unless the rock is covered in organic material, or you took it out of stream from behind an industrial plant, I wouldn't worry too much about sterilizing it (boiling or bleaching or anything else). Especially if it has been completely dried out. No fish pathogen is going to survive not being near fish for so long (fish parasites have to have fish to feed on, that's what makes them fish parasites), and no fish pathogen can survive being dried out. I would let them sit in that bucket of water for like a week or two and then test the change in pH. If it is large, then maybe something is wrong with it, but a tenth or 3 tenths of a pH unit isn't significant at all. 24 hours is probably not enough to know, however. Finally, the vinegar test isn't totally accurate. Vinegar is a very weak acid, and unless you have a very basic rock, the acid-base reaction isn't very strong and noticable. If you have a liquid test for nitrate, and your uses two bottles, the chemical in that second nitrate test bottle is nitric acid, which is a much stronger acid than vinegar. You can use that yo test your rock -- put a few drops on and if the rock fizzes a lot then it is basic and will raise your pH.