Also looking for opinions on this live sand

[Kryten]

Would you think this is a good deal? Anyone have any experience ordering live sand from the States? Would you just get a little bit of it and go the rest of the way with dry sand, or would you do your whole tank with this stuff? I'm new to sand as a substrate and not sure what's the best way to go.

http://cgi.ebay.ca/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?...e=STRK:MEWA:IT

or

http://cgi.ebay.ca/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?...e=STRK:MEWA:IT

[Joe Reefer]

I would buy new sand and get a couple of cups of sand from a friend with an established system to seed the new sand. The new sand will eventually become live sand.

[Myanth]

I bought aragamax live sand, two bags, and three 30 lb bags of dry sand and combined, (be sure to rinse dry sand for like... ever.) I then added them to the tank with one ten pound piece of liverock, a heater, about twenty gallons of water in a 90 gal tank, a powerhead, and a 20gph fountain pump pumping water through a one gallon plastic jug full of bio balls with a small hole in bottom.

I had a fully seated sand bed in a month, with brine, mysis, and hundreds of colonies of things swimming around. I left this set up for six months until I had the equipment ready for my 90 to be set up right. When I set it up I added 90 lbs of liverock and had it cured and cylcled completely in about three weeks.

This was the way I did it. It was expensive. I would recommend you using dry sand. Aragonite sugar sand for surface area. Then seed it with some sand from someone else. Just make sure you're not bringing anything that you don't want... like ich. The whole bed should seed in no time.

Good Luck

Mike

[Kryten]

Thanks for the suggestions. As far as the aragonite sugar sand goes is that something I should just get from a place like Big Al's (they have several varieties of aragonite sand), or is there a more cost effective place online?

[Joe Reefer]

The amount of flow in your tank should determine the grain size.
You may even want to consider bare bottom if you plan on having high flow. BTW fill us in on the system you are planning.

[Van down by the river]

The Imported Live Sand is a complete waste of your money for more reasons I care to type.

Follow Joe Reefer's advice.

In 15 years I've never had an exporter or retailer be able to prove that "Live Imported Sand" was collected and handled in such a manner that the organisms would survive transportation to a hobbyists aquarium. Any good quality live rock will quickly seed your sand bed.

The Aragamax live Sand Myanth refers too has no living organisms (worms or inverts). It is innoculated with bacteria in a dormant state. Once you add circulating water and oxygen it "seeds" your aquarium. This product seems to work, but so does adding live rock or some sand from a fellow aquarists tank.

Oh yeah, this is so true!

(be sure to rinse dry sand for like... ever.)

[Myanth]

I guess my point was not clear. The live sand I purchased was a waste of money. As I understand, the nitrosomas will not die unless frozen or boiled, but there are no inverts or antything in the live sand. Therefor, it will give you good bacterial growth but no "life" so to speak. That's why I had added a piece of liverock. I'm sure that's where the life came from.

And yeah.... it's like forever. I ran a hose into a 20 gal tank with it about a third full of sand, and with the hose running full force mixing the sand, rinsed for about an hour and a half, just overflowing the tank with milky water. It will eventually come clean.

[Kryten]

Thanks again. I'm planning to setup a small system ~20gal in my living room with minimal anything. I'm a fan of the theory that with enough live rock you don't need to do much to the tank, so I won't have a sump or fuge or any filters. Maybe just a small air-driven protein skimmer. I'm also not really planning to try and keep any particularly finicky corals.

I also have a 45 gal tank in my office that I want to switch to sand from the rough crushed coral (.5-1 cm) that I have now. So I guess the key to having sand then is to make sure you have just enough flow to not mess it all up? I don't really like the look of a tank with no substrate. What's the best grain size or type to use to maximize the bacterial filtration? Also am I best off going with a dsb of 4 inches or so, or is an inch or two sufficient?

Thanks!

[Myanth]

I used sugar sand, running 1200 gph through my sump and three 300 gph powerheads, I get some erosion patterns but they look natural and I like it, nothing becomes water-bourne (sp). All the finest particles were removed when rinsing or in the next week with a sponge in my sump.

Rinse rinse rinse.

Mike

[Bartman]

Regarding seeding live sand; has anyone tried GARF grunge and can comment on it?