hello i bought about 120 pounds of sand from somone a while ago and it has been sitting around till now because i am setting up my tank. i know the sand had to have been in some tank because it has alota snail shells and such. The sand looks clean like maybe he already cleaned it a long time ago.Do you think i should still rinse it? and if so how would i do that?
How to clean new sand
- Thread starter djcool563
- Start date
I would definatley rinse it with RO water. Just put it in a really big container and fill it up about half way. Stir the sand really really good and poor off the water. Repeat until it runs clear, even after stirring. The problem with using old sand that has not been rinsed really good is that it will hold a bunch of left over nutrients and nasty stuff, which will creat a really neat algae bloom in your new tank. If it is really bad and your source (tap) water is not too bad, you can run a hose into the bucket and do the final rinse with ro water.
You can but you will have to do a final rinse with ro or risk leaving what ever is in your tap water still in the sand. I guess if you drain it really well it would be ok. Just make sure you get all the detrius and other stuff out of the sand. I made that mistake and I am paying for it now three months later. I transferred my 90g over to my current 150g and used the old sand for half (new sand on the other half). Now I have all kinds of algae blooms on one side. 
That is what I get for being lazy when I rinsed the sand.
That is what I get for being lazy when I rinsed the sand.
Craig Lambert
Premium Member
I remember a post from Ron Shimick when someone asked if they could use the sand from a tank that was taken down sometime earlier. His response was do not use the sand as it has many dead micro organisms in it and you will have the mother of all algae blooms. Just an FYI.
