Sand, our experiences

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ccebr

ccebr

Candiru
MFK Member
Feb 16, 2010
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England
Ok so once again, I am faced by a cloudy tank.
This is why I went bare-bottom before, and it seems sand is just trouble.

I added play sand to the tank 2 weeks ago, after thoroughly rising. There was no clouding at all!
I thought, job done...tank looks much nicer.
However over the last couple of days the tank has been clouding up with more and more particles being in suspension.
Today, after a water change, the situation has worsened considerably (this is the 1st water change done since adding the sand).

I have quite large boisterous fish including catfish and cichlids, that stir up the sand.
Even if I manage to clear the particulate using filter wool in an internal filter, I am sure I'm doomed for it to occur over and over.

I would like to hear your experiences with using sand as a substrate, including...
  • what type of sand you use?
  • did you thoroughly rinse it before adding?
  • did the tank cloud up at the start?
  • does the tank randomly cloud up after time?
  • how do you get the water clear?
  • how big are the fish in the tank?
  • if you could choose a substrate now, what would it be?
 
I used play sand once. And never again. It's garbage. Basically it's a cloud of mud. I know it's dirt cheap and it works, but it was just too much of a constant headache...

I went with aragonite the next time around and it's night and day man.
 
I've used a few types of aquarium sand in the past including an aqua one black sand, and now a finer japanese brand of light colored sand...

The slightly larger particles black sand was easy as 123 to clean... This new finer sand that is like a fine beach sand was originally a bit of a P.I.T.A but thats coz i didnt fully rinse it well originally...

Now after a two years my tank water stays clear no matter how much i stir it up... Well except for the time it takes the sand to settle after stirring...


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i use play sand, and i actually did not rinse it before i used it (uneducated at the time) it clouded for the first two days, tops and i have not had a single problem with it at all. ive been using it for 6 months now and no big issues. i have 5 cories, 2 adult angels, a 8 in black ghost, 4 1/2 in striped raphael and 2 4-5 in senegal bichirs. i also keep some live plants and nerite snails.
 
i used the 100lb bag of fine white commercial sand from home depot. It washed easy and quick and doesn't cloud up the tank. I like the look way better and my fish love digging in it. Its 6$ but you get double the amount as the play sand. Should give it a try, ill never change back
 
I currently have black colorquartz "F" grade sand and play sand.

The colorquartz is very heavy so it settles easily. The only drawback from it was a bit of a greasy film at first, which I think could be avoided by simply washing better and possibly running some hot water over it before putting in the tank.

The play sand I washed very well. Put it in a 5 gallon bucket to no more than 1/2 full. Turn the hose on full blast and let anything that's small enough to wash over the top go. Everything heavy enough to stay in the bucket while you move the hose around is heavy enough to no cause clouding or be a problem with your fish stirring it up. What I don't like about it is how sharp some of the pieces are. My pleco doesn't like it nearly as much as he liked the colorquartz.

Fish sizes: everything from 1" up to a 12" oscar and pleco.
 
I use pool filter sand in pretty much all my tanks. No problems
 
If I were you, I'd take out all the play sand and replace it with pool filter sand from a pool supply store or use 3M Spectraquartz aka Colorquartz.

I've had only good experiences using Spectraquartz and pool filter sand. Neither one gets into my filter intakes because they're both relatively heavy. Both of them took me about 5 rinses to clean, but when I put them in my tank, they sank right away and didn't cloud my tank at all. I've heard a lot of bad things about play sand though. I've heard that it's easy to get into filters, much dirtier than pool filter sand and take much longer to clear up in the water.
 
i use caribsea Tahitian moon sand. i run a hose with the sand in a bucket and let the water overflow taking all the super small particles that will float, then i dump it into my tank, it's cloudy for maybe few hours but after that it clears up, the fish i have stir it up quite a bit and it gets cloudy/messy when i feed them but it quicky clears up, the sand doesnt stay suspended for too long enough to reach my overflows so it's all good.

fyi 3M discontinued colorquartz but i hear some people are still able to find it. (lucky)
 
I use Quikrete "medium grade" sand mixed with a bit of natural colored gravel. I find that the combination of the two makes for a very natural look. I have used pool filter sand before and although I liked the grain size and weight, it was simply way to "white" colored. I like a tanner, more earthy color.

I did wash it quite well before putting it into my tank. I used the normal cleaning method... About 25lbs in a 5 gallon bucket with the hose running, all while constantly stirring it. Not a fun task, but there really isn't any way around it...

Normal tank maintenance, the sand does not cloud the water. However, if I move a lot of the substrate around and stir it up well, it will cloud up a bit. After the tank sits overnight, the water is back to normal again.

I keep a mix of Central Americans... Nics, Meeki, Multispinosa and a JD.
 
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