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CURRENT
TRENDS IN CULTIVATING LIVE ROCK
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In 1992 Walt
Smith International in the Kingdom of Tonga (South Pacific)
began the harvest and export of live rock which was in
demand because of the quickly developing “mini reef” market
for the aquarium industry worldwide. There were three types
(or shapes) available at this time and the most popular was
Tonga Red Branch followed by Reef Rock and Shelf.
In about 1994 a new player in the industry began shipping
live rock out of Fiji and it quickly became the most popular
in the industry because of its shape, heavy coverage of
coralline algae and porosity making the rock very
lightweight to ship. This was a very attractive feature
since all rock was shipped by air freight and air freight is
charged by the kilo.
In 1995 Walt Smith International was invited to Fiji by the
Fisheries Department to participate in the emerging aquarium
industry and help to set the standards based on my knowledge
of the industry and my highly developed husbandry techniques
utilized in Tonga.
Once we settled in Fiji we immediately started shipping live
rock collected along the western side of the main island. We
chose this site because of the high amount of nutrients in
the water, due to agricultural runoff, and the amount loose
porous rock covered in sufficient amounts of the required
coralline algae. This attractive and lightweight rock soon
became very popular among hobbyist worldwide
After several years of exporting large quantities of live
rock week after week those who were uninformed of the actual
and realistic sustainability issues started to voice their
concerns. During that time a scientist was engaged to study
the harvest and submit a report on the socio economic
assessment and environmental impact. The studies that were
carried out proved that the harvest was both valuable to the
economy and was sustainable. However, it was my view that we
must also develop an alternative means to supply the growing
need of live rock to the aquarium industry. Even though it
was not entirely necessary to do so, it became an important
contribution to help ease the concerns and showed that our
industry is listening and adaptable.
In 1998 we began experimenting with the idea of growing coral
by placing large racks in the sea and using fragments of
larger colonies of coral to place on these racks mounting
the fragments to manmade plugs. At the same time this was
developing I had the idea to start making larger pieces of
manmade rock utilizing the same technique we developed for
making the plugs. There were many experiments carried out
with the goal to achieve a realistic looking rock from
cement and various other forms of substrate to give it a
natural appearance. However, the biggest challenge was the
weight. You see, cement did not have the same porosity as
the natural harvested rock so it made this rock much heavier
to ship and thus, unattractive to the market.
We tried many different techniques and materials to minimize
the weight that included mixing hollow pasta, polystyrene,
popcorn and blowing air into the mix to name a few. However,
none of the attempts provided us with the desired results.
As I continued to search for a material that would be both
light and porous I stumbled on the answer quite by accident.
The solution was provided by an erupting volcano! One day
while driving my boat to one of our collection sites I
became startled by what sounded like a car driving on a
loose gravel road. I finally realized that I was driving
right across a patch of floating pumice pellets that have
been ejected from a volcano under the sea. This is actually
a quite common occurrence and I remembered seeing these
pellets all over the beaches in both Tonga and Fiji. There
was literally about one square acre of floating, porous
stones! To make matters even more interesting the beaches
were littered with this stuff all over the island. It didn’t
take me long to realize that I quite possibly have found the
answer to my problem. Pumice was porous, volumetric and
light weight … in fact, it floated!
I soon arranged for one of our crew to visit a village on the
coral coast where I had remembered seeing this stuff
littering the beach. The Fiji custom dictates that you
approach a village in a formal manner and ask permission (kare
kare) from the Chief to take samples from their fishing
grounds, in this case the beach. Once we determine that the
samples are useful to us then it becomes necessary to do
things in a more formal manner which requires a visit from
me and gifts to the village. They hold a ceremony called
Savu Savu and we present our proposal to the elders of the
village for them to vote on our request. In short, we
offered to hire the village members to harvest these little
grey stones that lay all over the beach and that we would
pay them for this harvest. At this point a price must be
offered and the voting is done in a formal village meeting
usually carried out a few days or a few weeks after the Savu
Savu. Of course we got permission to pay for these stones
that was a nuisance to them and useful to us. This is how
you create a small community project that benefits both
parties.
Once we started receiving truckloads of pumice from several
different villages the large scale of manmade live rock
commenced. However, we soon found out that we had one more
serious obstacle to overcome. Making wet cement mimic a
piece of rough, porous irregular rock that was harvested
from the sea is not as easy as it sounds. If the manmade
rock did not look “natural” we would never receive the
support from the market and this product would be rejected.
So, into the mix went sand, loose coral ruble found at the
high tide mark on the beach and pumice stones about the size
of a peanut. We then trained some Fiji craftsman to take all
these different materials and shape the mix into assorted
shapes that gave the finished product the same appearance as
natural live rock. Once dried in the sun for about 6 weeks
the rock was fully cured and ready to be placed on the farm
out on the reef.
The rock takes about 18 months to take on a sufficient amount
of coralline coverage and introduce the micro organisms that
live within the rock that makes if a beneficial live rock
for the aquarium. However, on our first attempt we noticed
that we had another small problem after about 6 months. When
you place a rock made from cement into the water it still
looks like grey cement unless the coralline reaches 100%
full coverage. Since this hardly ever happens, even on
natural live rock, we found that we had grey and red rock
that did not look natural enough for aquarist to accept. In
the real world the rocks from the sea take on a darker tone
because they are not made from cement but rather hundreds or
thousands of years of fossilized coral substrate. When this
happens the natural rock base blends more naturally with the
coralline coverage. This presented a problem for us and made
it necessary to go back to the drawing board to meet this
new challenge. I soon researched different types of cement
dyes that were non toxic. I finally came across a pink and
red mixture of oxide that looked quite bright when freshly
mixed but after months in the sea took on a more natural
dark red color and worked perfectly for our application. We
were now on the way to go into full production with a
product the industry would accept and appreciate …….. or
would they?
On our first attempts to find a suitable location to place
the rocks in the ocean we decided that the western coral
coast was the most logical choice since it was the same area
the we harvested the natural live rock we have been selling
for years. However, this location presented us with a
challenge we had not anticipated. The area is mostly made up
of large tidal flats that extended several hundred meters to
the reef edge. These flats have huge swells rolling over
them that would cause our rock to be moved all around by
nature and by the time of harvest we would probably never be
able to find it. We came up with a solution to mold the
rocks with a hole in the center so that we could run a thick
cable through each rock at tie them all together by securing
them to stakes we had positioned at each end. It was sort of
like a clothes line full of manmade rocks. We thought we had
solved the problem of controlling the movements of our rocks
but had no idea that once they were ready for market it
would be hard to convince the trade to accept rocks that all
took on the appearance of a donut. After a several years on
the market these rocks only occupied a very small percentage
of our overall rock sales. It wasn’t until about five years
on the market until we realized that the hole in the middle
was the problem. At this point we have invested about eight
years into the project (with three years product development
and five years marketing) and it became obvious that there
were still some changes that needed to be made if we were
going to enjoy any success with this product at all. We did
not want to give up.
In 2004 we began to experiment by putting our “donut” shapes
on reef slopes in the same areas where we have our coral
farms. Much to our delight we found that the rock stayed
where we put it and developed an acceptable coverage of
coralline algae. In 2005 I decided that we needed to change
our whole approach and started to dabble with interesting
shapes that did not include the whole. Once I saw the
results I was sure that we finally had a product the
industry would embrace. However, it would eventually take at
least 18 months to bring this to market in order to allow
the coralline enough time to fully develop. About this same
time a graduate student at the University of the South
Pacific needed a research project to pursue his MA degree in
marine studies. He chose to make a study comparing the
natural live rock against the manmade live rock and the
residual benefits to the aquarium. When the study was
completed he was able to prove that the manmade live rock
was just as beneficial and natural harvested live rock. This
was amazing news for us.
Today we have approximately 800,000 kgs of manmade rock and
60,000 pieces of coral growing at various stages on several
different farm sites around the reefs in Fiji. This rock has
finally made a useful contribution to our sales. Comparing
it to the early years when this product was about 2% of our
overall rock sales today we have achieved over 20% and that
number keeps rising. Walt Smith International will continue
to encourage the aquarium industry to endorse this product
and believes that it will help bridge the gap between those
that have a negative perception of our harvest and those
that understand that a sustainable, renewable resource can
be greatly enhanced by creating awareness and making
alternatives available to all who want to participate in
this fascinating hobby.
Walt Smith |
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