Hi Guys and Gals,
Here is my 2 cents worth;
Over the last three months I have closely worked with a Marine Biologist and during this time I at times felt like such an idiot as I thought I have read so much and that I knew quite a bit....needless to say UHU, not nearly enough to keep my own when chatting to him.
Now, his take on Live Rock is that here in SA there is a HUGE misconception amongst many hobbyists and "specialists" in that most people believe rock with coreline on it is the best. He showed me umpteen times that coraline is just ONE type of algae and that it is not the begin all and end all to have a scape with tons of rock with just coreline on it.
He explained further that for Live Rock to be effective in any Marine tank it needs to have as much life forms on it as possible. What is the purpose of Live Rock in your tank? Just as a pleasing visual effect or do you want more? What does Live Rock do in nature? Are the hobbyist not trying to mimic nature as far as possible in his / her tank? Was his questions.
In going with that his opinion is that Live Rock in nature filters the water, IF, it has various Life Forms on it! (Makes sense doesn't it?) On any reef / Live rock in the sea there are numerous little critters all doing and having their own little jobs and niches. All of them breaking down and adding to the biological processes needed to keep the system healthy. Thus, with adding Live Rock with just one form of life on it to any system doesn't add much value in biological terms, you need to find rock with various forms of life on it to really be beneficial to a tank.
As far as a DSB goes; are there not bacteria that lives on the rock which will also benefit the DSB? Are sand beds completely void of rocks in nature?
In walking and talking with him I assure you I have seen plenty of tanks that he services and maintains and all of them are as individual as their owners.
Yes there are a few which have the purple-pink coreline all over it, but then they also have other things growing in there as well.
In my opinion from spending time with him, the question each and every one should ask is how many different life forms can I see on my Rock and then take it from there.
Can you see the following:
Copopods, Tube Worms, various forms of Chaulerpa, Sponges, Algae, Shrimps, Crabs, Corals, Snails, Anemones, Tunikets, Pollyps, etc, etc? Are these life forms growing and healthy? If you can see these small things in your tank doing well, then definitely your tank should be healthy and surely you should be well on your way.
When diving you will definitely notice that the ocean doesn't have just a purple-pink tint, it is alive with so much more and funnily enough, the purple-pink is by far outshone by greens, browns, and other colours.
SELA, use it don't use it, up to you and your common sense. LOL, just joking!