Dumb idea but I want to change my sand...

[nightOwl]

Hello all,
I am hoping i can either get a good deturnant or some fresh ideas to help with my disasterus plan. I know its a dumb idea but here is what i want to do. I want to change my sand in my 90 gal tank. When I first set this think back in Nov 2004 I thought it would be cool to use black sand insteadof the sand from my 55 gal. The only thing is that it (the black sand) was not aragonite sand (Looking back that was dumb, really dumb). My tank has been going for ever now and I can not seem to get the coralline to grow like I want it to. I have a lot pretty colors but its not growing as fast as I want it to grow or as fast as it did in my 55. I had to scrape it from the front of the glass every week and a half with my 55 gal. I can't even think of the brand of black sand I used but I want to replace it with Caribsea Aragonite. With the black sand I don't get the reflective abiltiy to help disperse the light throughout the tank. I talked to some people at the lfs and they suggested i do it also of course suggesting i buy so many pounds of live sand from them I am still picking my mouth off the ground.

1. I know i can not do it all at one time but are there any suggestions on how much to chang out at one time? Or a way to do it.


Thanks in advance,
Henry

 

[Paintbug]

changing the sand is not going to make your coralline grow faster. keeping your alk, calc, and magnesium levels in check will. happen to have any of these readings?

if you want to change the sand for the looks of it. how much do you have in there? inch wise? if its only 1-2" i dont see a problem removing it all at once. just try to save as much clean water as you can from the tank.

 

[nightOwl]

Hey Paintbug,
I want to change the sand for better buffering capacity of the Aragonite sand as that has an indirect affect to keeping pH and Alk stable. It will also help disperse the light a little better in the tank as white reflects light and currently this black sand is absorbing light and keeping my tank not looking as bright as it should. Below are my latest water parameter readings. I am currently working on the nitrates. I just posted these in another post so they are current as of last night . I don't have the magnesium reading but I am getting my water tested tomorrow at my lfs. I need to order a magnesium test kit.
I have about 2 1/2" of sand and about 140 lbs of lr. My rock is not resting on the bottom of the tank but is on a pvc/egg crate support system. So I won't have to worry too much about stirring up the sand around the base of the rock to much.

Nitrate - 15 ppm
Nitrite - 0 ppm
Ammonia - 0 ppm
pH - 8.4
kH - 10.2 dkH
Alk - 3.66meg/l
Phosphate - 0 meg/l
Calcium - 450 ppm



Thanks in advance,
Henry

 

[Paintbug]

the buffering level of aragonite sand is minimal at best. your PH will have to drop to a level well below what any livestock could withstand before the sand begins to break down and buffer the PH any. when used in a DSB, there are spots with there is little oxygen. these spot will drop the PH way down and you will get some buffering there. but again minimal. with a SSB 1-2" you will not get these spots, thus no buffering.
i will agree with the lighting aspect. you will see much more distribution of the light in the tank with white sand!

im not a big fan of the black sand myself and would change it. your alk, and calc levels are good so theres not a need to worry about the supposed buffering from the sand anyway . i would just swap it for the better light distribution alone.

 

[nightOwl]

Paintbug,
That sounds good to me. I don't know what I was thinking with the black sand. I thought It would be so cool in my basement. I plan to using some of the existing sand of course, but I will put that in the back of the tank and a thin layer in the middle and then the new sand on top of it. No more dark sand for me . This will help the tank look brighter for sure.


1. I am wondering about how many bags of sand should I buy?
2. Will this cause a small cycle?


Thanks,

Henry

 

[HBtank]

Have fun, did the same thing this weekend and took me about 6 hours plus.

I had a mix of CC and black sand that the previous owner had used, and I did it primarily because it was a nitrate trap.. But now I must say it is worth it just for the light, it looks much better in the tank now.

I personally used 100 pounds of really white silica sand (cost $6) and 20 pounds of "live" aragonite sand to seed it. My water was clear in about 5 hours by using a canister filter with poly filter material.

Took forever, and what a mess. I still have not rearranged my rock...

 

[Paintbug]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=6679838#post6679838 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by nightOwl
Paintbug,
That sounds good to me. I don't know what I was thinking with the black sand. I thought It would be so cool in my basement. I plan to using some of the existing sand of course, but I will put that in the back of the tank and a thin layer in the middle and then the new sand on top of it. No more dark sand for me . This will help the tank look brighter for sure.


1. I am wondering about how many bags of sand should I buy?
2. Will this cause a small cycle?


Thanks,

Henry

1. it depends on how deep you want. for 1-2", 75lbs or so will do a 90g. i have about 150lbs in my 75g. it has the same footprint of a 90g. my sandbed is about 4-5" deep. theres no need to get all of it "live". you can get most the sand dry. it will be cheaper than the pre-bagged live sand. then get a 1-2lbs of actual live sand from the LFS or from a local reefer even. that will be enough to seed it with. your LR will take care most the seeding anyway. if you happen to see some little creatures moving around in your current sand try to save them as well.

2. if you can save about 60-75% of the water, and keep it clean, you might see a slight cycle but very little. so small it shouldnt effect the livestock. you shouldnt have any but you might see slightly elevated nitrites, and nitrates. but it will go away quickly.

 

[nightOwl]

HBtank,
Thanks for giving me a heads up on how much time its going to take. Correct me if im wrong but I thought silca sand was bad and tends to lead to high diatoms outbreaks. If that is not true you are looking to save me a lot of money because the sand is like $20 a bag and the bags are only 15 lbs...lol. So thats about $140 in sand...such a rip off. I guess I should think about rearranging my rock work as well. Sounds like a weekend project in the making . Btw where did you buy the sand?

Thanks for the heads up,
Henry

 

[Paintbug]

i use pure silica sand. again, silica causing diatoms is another myth. silica cant break down into the water unless under great pressures. somewhere around the 300' below sea level. but one problem that can accure with silica is most of it has sharpe edges. this can cause injuries for you sand shifters. some times it will cut their gills, leading to infections. i have a Spotted Shrimp Goby, i havent seen any problems with him yet. i have had him for about 8-9 months. i got my sand from Home Depot. look around at HD and Lowes. they have been known to have aragonite sands as well. if the bag doesnt say anything about silicates causing cancer, then its a good chance its aragonite. to tell put a little in a cup and put some viniger on it. if it fizzes its aragonite.

when looking at sand look at the grains REAL close. you want small grains, and they should be as smooth and round as possible.

 

[HBtank]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=6680586#post6680586 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by nightOwl
HBtank,
Thanks for giving me a heads up on how much time its going to take. Correct me if im wrong but I thought silca sand was bad and tends to lead to high diatoms outbreaks. If that is not true you are looking to save me a lot of money because the sand is like $20 a bag and the bags are only 15 lbs...lol. So thats about $140 in sand...such a rip off. I guess I should think about rearranging my rock work as well. Sounds like a weekend project in the making . Btw where did you buy the sand?

Thanks for the heads up,
Henry

Most that is said about silica sand is a myth, though there seems to be a little truth about aragonite being able to buffer acidic buildup deep in a sand bed, but again there does not seem to be any "real" evidence that this actually happens or makes a real difference.

I personally liked the difference on my pocketbook..... Went down to Lowes (Home Depot is just as good) on a recommendation from here and got the 100 pound bag of Quikrete medium silica commercial sand (I must say it is really white and settled almost overnight for me ) and added 20 pounds of Carib seas "live sand" on top. I mixed it a little to seed it but not to much.

Yeh it took me a long time. Maybe an hour extra because I removed some fish at the same time and took a 40 min run to the LFS. But still, the process of removing the rock, saving the water, removing the sand, and reassembling it without making an absolute mess or hurting the rock was time consuming to say the least.