Adding Sand After Live Rock

[Ostridge]

Hi everyone,

Im just starting up a tank and i have read in a few books and online that you should put the live rock down first and then the live rock. So i went ahead and did this, but my live rock seems to have lost all its color and is like bleached white? Is that normal and is it going to become colorfull again? I have tried to blow sand off the rocks but there is none on them.

 

[vyerous]

If it hasn't been in light it could lose its color over time, however if it has been out of water then it will lose its color because the coraline and regular algae has died.

 

[saganeer]

i´d put the sand first , live rock directly can crack the bottom glass, as for the bleached rock +1 vyerous

 

[vyerous]

Thanks but I'll have to respectfully disagree with you saganeer.

While I find it is easier to put the rock in after the sand, if you plan on getting sand burrowing livestock I would recommend putting the rock first, simply because it eliminates the possibility of a cave in. The alternative to this is making sure the rock is pushed all the way through the sand till its on the glass but I don't like the grinding and what not in the process. What I personally did was put eggcrate on the bottom of my tank, set the rock in, then put the sand around it (some under the rock as well), thus eliminating the grinding and crunching on the glass and there is no potential for cave ins from the rock.

Another thing is a lot of tempered glass is typically 4x (literally) stronger than regular glass, unless your dropping rocks in there I think you should be ok.

Just my .02 Do what you want =D

 

[n00by]

It would also depend on how deep your SB is going to be. In my case, i'm only going to have like a 3/4" SB maybe 1", I could place the sand in first then the rock. I myself would prefer to put in the sand then the rock it's just makes sense that way. However, aside from everything else said when you place the liverock in the tank expect debris to fly off and land on the sand. Trying to siphon this out on top of sand will be almost impossible. If you ignore it you'll have possible bacteria problems in the SB?

 

[eho72]

I've been debating putting the sand first or rock first on my new build. Since my sand bed is only 1-2 inches, I've decided to go sand first then put the rocks on top. The reason for doing this is that I will get a flat and level sand bed that looks better instead of hills here and there.

 

[vyerous]

Yea but once you get livestock and properflow, you're going to get hills. Plus I like sand burrowing critters so I didn't want to risk killing them.

 

[muddysr5]

In my 300, I put in sand (4-6") first then the live rock. I didn't experience any major cave ins, but I did notice that one side was not quite as sturdy as the rest. Not a huge deal, but still, I had to go back and redo what I had previously done.

I like the egg crate idea alot! Good advice.

In the long run, it sounds like it depends on how many times you want to potentially restack, huh?

 

[vyerous]

True that. I just recently aquascaped and I like having the eggcrate. I pick my base rock, jiggle it down till I feel the egg crate, then its a sturdy foundation that I build off of. I'm huge on stable rock, all of my rock is just sitting on each other, no glue, zip ties, nothing, but the rock all fits together like puzzle pieces, no chance of knock it down... I also spend almost 6 hours doing this in a 90gallon too. I'm really dizzy when its all said and done.

 

[DaveMilly]

I'm putting Sand first, the reason why ive chosen this is because im only getting a 29 gallon Nano, the Rocks won't be that high, and the sandbed won't be that deep (1/4 - 1/2 inch). I dont see 1/2 inch of borrowing underneath the rock being a problem to be honest! thats the idea anyway

 

[n00by]

Listen... the ocean was built without thought. Should the SB be put on first or should the rocks be placed in first. If the faith of a fish is to be crushed by a 5lb liverock then it's just the way it is.

Yes if that fish costs over $50 it's a waste but simplydo what will be easier. Both methods have their pro's and con's.

 

[muddysr5]

that's an interesting thought...the ocean was built without thought...let me ponder that for a few...

it is sort of like, the chicken and the egg - which came first?

now we have, the sand or the rock - which came first?

 

[n00by]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=15169979#post15169979 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by muddysr5
that's an interesting thought...the ocean was built without thought...let me ponder that for a few...

it is sort of like, the chicken and the egg - which came first?

now we have, the sand or the rock - which came first?

Haha, what a great hobby, eh?

What did you do in your case with the 300g?

 

[muddysr5]

its definitely a work in progress but without knowing everything that i have in there (long story), but here are the basics...

60 lbs of live rock (obviously can still get more in)
1 yellow tang
1 sailfin tang
2 black and white clowns (mated pair - they may have done the deed once already, i just wasn't all that knowledgeable to know what had happened - I plead ignorance on that one)
1 pink anenome (hosted by the clowns)

And here are the corals I do not know the correct names of (still learning)
LOTS of sunset coral
LOTS of brown polyps
LOTS of xenia
3 large heads of frog spawn
something someone told me was a birds nest
some leathery looking corals that have tiny little nubby looking things
AND a ton of other stuff that I still am learning the words for

Now, if you are asking whether or not I did sand or rock first...b/c of $$ constraints, I did the sand first. My depth is anywhere from 4" at its lowest point to 6" at its deepest point. I had to rebuild the rock once, for two reasons - 1) I wasn't 100% crazy about how I set them in there the first time and 2) an area on the left side of the tank became unstable.

That all said...I still have lots to learn...sigh...
Now, if I could learn how to post my pics of the tanks in this forum (or in my gallery) that would be great! Everytime I try to upload it tells me the file is too big. When I look at the properties of the pic, it shows that it is small enough to fit the parameters of RCs upload (50 kb), but then I am told that there was a problem with the pic and it couldn't be uploaded.

 

[muddysr5]

whoops - forgot about the 5 blue/green chromis

 

[Michael]

rock first for me, leave it 3-4 days until your totally satisfied with the final rock layout and then add 1" of sand around the rocks.

 

[jenjen]

I put sand then rock in my 90gal, but was always worried about a rock slide and didn't risk any sand burrowing fish.

In the 180gal I put egg crate down, filled it to level with sand, added the base rocks then the rest of the sand, then aquascaped with the rest of the rock.

The rock structure is really stable, and it was easy to add the sand because I didn't have to work around all the aquascaping.

 

[cdbias2]

Of all the post on RC. Show me 1 post that someone has broke the bottom glass with their live rock.
This is so rare that it's almost a myth. It may be a myth because I know I've never seen the thread.
This is nothing but wasted worries and eggcrate.

 

[jenjen]

Probably true, but the $10 I spent on egg crate gives me peace of mind.

To the OP's question - the sequence that you added sand/rock shouldn't have anything to do with the rock changing colour. Do you have a pic? What are your parameters? Do you have lights on the tank? Anything else in there besides sand & rock?

 

[n00by]

Muddysr5,

If you had to do it all over again would you do it the same way? Sand before rock, etc... ?