Sand beoming black!

[CoMMaNdeR]

I know it is less of oxygen under or in the sand and that's why it is turning from white to black and I know it means dead spots buy guys now what should I do? Should I worry alot?

I was thinking to bring a big bucket, a pipe and siphon as much as I can to the bucket. Throw it away and replace the lost water with new one...

What you think please?

 

[scubasteve247]

why did you turn over your sand in the first place, in doing so you kill anerobic bacteria that can release toxins into the water........

 

[CoMMaNdeR]

Maybe I didn't explained well. I did not touch the sand or turn it. I am just seeing black sand under on the bottom.. The sand was white but now great part of it is turning black. What should I do now ?

 

[Secondgen]

I would use a gravel vac siphon hose to clean the sand as well as possible. If you are careful you can clean the sand with the vac without taking any sand out of the system. Don't worry everything should be allright. Continue this process until it is clean again. I did this to a 10 gallon I had setup, and everything turned out ok.

 

[CoMMaNdeR]

How do you mean to clean the dead spots that I have of smelly dead spots sand? And why does the sand turn black, is this normall in all tanks?

 

[TitusvileSurfer]

How deep is your sand bed? How deep are these spots? Do you see them against the front of your glass under the surface or on top of the surface throughout the tank?

 

[HBtank]

I would not touch it without some more info, advice, pictures, etc..

If it is really a bad situation, the last thing you want to do is disturb it ...

 

[flyyyguy]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=10933369#post10933369 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by HBtank
I would not touch it without some more info, advice, pictures, etc..

If it is really a bad situation, the last thing you want to do is disturb it ...

agreed. If its hydrogen sulfide, the last thing you want to do is disturb it in any way

 

[lancer99]

Commander,
Has the change effected the inhabitants of your tank?

If not, you probably shouldn't do anything except let nature take its course.

If it's a black color on TOP of the sand, that probably just cyano.

If it's under the top layer of the sand, you still can't judge whether the sand is anoxic/anaerobic based solely on its color.

Opinions vary on the formation of H2S in sand beds...but the consensus seems to be that it's more toxic to our noses than tank inhabitants.

If I were you (but I'm not!) I'd just leave it alone.

-Robert

 

[CoMMaNdeR]

Hi guys,

In the sump I have the same situation. Maybe the reason of this is that I have very fine sand. I turn a bit the sand of my sump and underneath the top 1 inch layer it was dark grey/black and smelled really bad.

In my tank I have some patches of about 6 inch long for example and deep 1 or 2 inch. The total deep of my sand is about 3 inch. Some areas even 4 inch..

The inhabitats since now look ok, my only bad thing that I have is a slightly cyano bloom on the top layes of the sand.

I was thinking to try to siphon out the dark parts where I can see of my sand bad out to a trash can. What do you think?

 

[Fiziksgeek]

I had the same problem. I used a "white play sand", only about a 2-3" bed. Several people in the area use it with success, but not me. The top half inch or so was kind of crusty and when you break through it, black, after just a few months.

I did exactly what you mentioned, started a siphon slowly started taking the sand out slowly. Every night I mixed up some new salt water, and the next day I would use it to replace what I had siphoned out along with the sand. Took several days, but seemed to work just fine. I am currently BB.