Play sand is THE worst substrate

  • We are currently upgrading MFK. thanks! -neo
L

lipadj46

Feeder Fish
MFK Member
Mar 11, 2011
936
0
0
queensbury
Finally got rid of my play sand substrate after having countless pockets of anaerobic sand form (you can literally see the black sand). Also I recently had my 55 gallon spring a leak at the bottom seam in the middle (strange place to start leaking). From the looks of it an anaerobic pocket formed there and the acidic conditions ate away the silicone. The tank is only a year old and I've never seen anything like this before. I tried everything from stirring to trumpet snails to going down to a 1" layer and nothing would stop the pockets from forming. They would also kill any plants that happen to be growing in that section, the roots would turn black and rot.

So I resealed the tank and switched to pool filter sand and hopefully won't have to deal with that mess ever again. The pool filter sand did not even need rinsing where I lost 50% of my playsand in the rinsing process. So a warning to those with play sand, keep any eye out for black pockets in the substrate and keep on stiring things up.
 
It is your duty as an aquarist to make sure that there is nothing decomposing in your sandbed...this is why I will always prefer substrates that you can use a gravel vacuum with...but that is just me.
 
that stinks to hear. I personally never had that issue myself, but I did find it a pain in the butt to clean. I would clean all the fish poop up and then 2 days later it would look exactly the same. That is what made me switch.
 
i am going to be moving my 125 gal soon and i was considering switching it to sand, now i think i will stick with the gravel
 
FLESHY;5132540; said:
It is your duty as an aquarist to make sure that there is nothing decomposing in your sandbed...this is why I will always prefer substrates that you can use a gravel vacuum with...but that is just me.
Click to expand...

With the small grain size I doubt there is that much large chunks of detritus that gets down deep. Just enough organics seep down there to feed the anaerobic bacteria. I don't see how you can clean it though the way it compacts.
 
I have play sand in 3 of my 10s and i just use a clean (bought for this purpose) kitty litter scoop to "strain" the sand in the tank w/o stirring it up too much. Cost me $1 at dollar tree! I am considering using a larger grain sand as this is a very fine sand though my gravel vacuum doesn't suck up to much of it, just have to be careful!
 
In my planted tank I used marine grad sand. Crushed coral mixed in with aragonite. Works great. For my other non-planted tanks, pool filter sand is my favorite. Oh, I also have river rocks in another tank. I agree that play sand is a pain.
 
Where did you get the sand? I called my local pool place and they said they don't use sand any more. Some sort of fiberglass or something new.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
MonsterFishKeepers.com
Top Bottom