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hey guys and gals ive been thinking about putting sand in my 30 gal. ive heard sand can sometimes be troublesome. i have two fish in my tank that would burrow. no live plants.
i have a penguin 150 power filter. any advice would be much appreciated thanks everyone! oh and one last question
if i do decide to get some any ideas on where to find it? thanks again!
sora

The true test of character is not how much we know how to do, but how we behave when we dont know what to do.

I just set up a 55 gallon tank with white play sand. It looks amazing, I have some big river rocks from a landscaping store mixed in. The sand will be great for burrowing fish and fish with barbels, like cories.

You can use play sand from landscaping and hardware stores. Go with the white kind if they have it. It cost me $3.50 for a 50-60lbs bag, enough for a 2-3" deep bed in my 55 gallon. If you want live plants I have heard crypts do well in sand.

You should keep the layer of sand about 1-1.5" in depth so you don't develop anaerobic pockets, pockets of toxic gases that form when waste gets caught in the sand and there is little or no water movement. You should stir the sand every time you do a water change, or get some MTS to do it for you.

When cleaning it, don't push the gravel vacuum into the sand, keep it about 1" above the surface and wave it around to stir up the waste and it will suck it up. If any sand gets vacuumed up, just squeeze the tube and it should fall back down.

I hope you decide to use the sand, it looks great and isn't as much trouble as some say.

Thanks! ive wanted sand since before i even got my tank. i didnt know stuff from the hardware store would work! Im going to try for it soon. ive heard sometimes filters and sand dont work? i hope thats not true. i really want sand, thanks for replying!


The true test of character is not how much we know how to do, but how we behave when we dont know what to do.

The biggest problem with sand is the anerobic pockets that develop.
I switched from gravel to sand after tons of research and ended up losing my corys in the end anyway, not to mention two filter impellers.

As was mentioned you MUST keep the depth of sand much shallower than you would the gravel 1" is or less is best. This allows light to penetrate the sand layer to kill off anerobic spots and allows the fish or snails you may have in the tank to get to the bottom and make sure the sand isnt trapping gasses. Manually turning the gravel is also a good idea as well as keeping Malaysian Trumpet Snails.

Substrate cleaning will be different, as you wont go to the bottom but stay above the surface. Also you may find you need to raise the lenght of your intake on the filter if it's too close to the sand it'll be sucked up ruining the impeller (not a pretty sound ). You may even need to cover the intake with a fine mesh. This causes its own share of problems as the motor has to run harder and the filtration isn't as good.

I got my sand like truestar did. Play sand or white landscaping sand. Stay away from the stuff in concrete mixing section that will raise the ph.


^_^

Personally I would not touch sand if it was free and they paid me to take it away.
Reasons as Babel mentioned it can cause problems and it does. Then there is the filration/cleaning problems it can cut an impella up extremly fast as fine sand is a very good cutter.

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Keith

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Hello sora, saw the post I could not resist a reply, I guess first off if ya have critters that like to burrow, the play sand that truestar mentioned would be a good choice, superfine granules that are abrasive to pump impellers, unfortunatly, I believe covering the intake of your HOB-PF with a fine enough mesh material to block even some of the sand, the pump may cavitate and water flow would be drastically reduced, IMHO, let the filter intake flow freely place the pickup no closer than say 3inches from surface of sand, about the only time yer gonna get it in the filter is during a PWC or the fish stir some up.
As fas as vacuming while doing a water chance, I've modified my python to accomadate a 2-liter bottle with the bottom cut out, this increases the "footprint" of the area being drawn under vacume, but still stirs up all the debris to be removed, not the sand.
The bed thickness of 1.5 in should be ok to prevent the anerobic dead spots, if it gets thicker in a few places, no worries, the regular WC and vacuming should keep that in check, OH YES.. almost fergot heh, the playsand found in hardware stores is mostly lime sand, this will push your water hardness to a fairly hard range and knock the PH up a few degrees.
the best thing about using sand as an aggerate, it just looks too darn good!!, so natural !!
I currently have about 120lbs of tahitian black sand in my 46 bow I run a TetraTek PF-500, and a Pondmaster 1800 pushing the reverse-flow UGF, (pump internal)
have a peekhttp://i231.photobucket.com/albums/ee52/ironhand74/CopyofPicturevarious087_720x480.jpg
hope this helps some , gotta see some pics when your all set up !!

i would never use play sand. it goes hard and plants struggle in it.
i have a coarse sand in one of my tanks and plants are doing well in there. it looks very natural. btw the sand was for aquariums.

when i first put it in the water was very murky and it took a day to settle. i did wash it out before putting it in there but it was still dirty. now the water is crystal clear. the only thing that would disturb the sand that is in the tank is a big apple snail.

i bought it from coles (grocery store) and it was 49c(au) for a 1 kg bag. so i bought every bag (there was only 4 bags).

hi
woot woot woot woot woot woot

I use beach and river sand and I honestly don't think I could be persuaded to go back to gravel. Maintenance is a breeze as you just waft the vac over the surface and flick the filter off for a minute and swoosh your hand through a little to decompact it. Just remember whenever you are doing anything with the finer types of sand, turn the filter off briefly, as the particles stay suspended in the water for a while and get sucked into the filter. I'm onto my 2nd powerhead in one tank for sand issues, though the original turned out to just be jammed, not burned out. All of my intake tubes are raised and all my substrate is 1-1.5" deep (except for where it has been excavated by the inhabitants) and really, I love it.

I use beach sand (Sydney white) which is pretty much inert and a light gold colour. It also has soft particles, which is important for burrowing fish. Small sharp particles are bad news, it would be like walking on broken glass.

In another tank I use coarse river sand, which looks fantastic but is fairly dirt-like in appearance and too spiky for fish to burrow in IMO.

For animals, the entire universe has been neatly divided into things to (a) mate with, (b) eat, (c) run away from, and (d) rocks. - Terry Pratchett

hey guys sorry i was on earlier but didnt get achance to reply. i took a break to check my fish and discovered my dojo loach had passed. ok well it seems like theres alot of differing opinions on the virtues of sand. I really cant decide now. i really really really want sand but now im a little nervous. it would be better looking and good for my raphael to dig in but... if i mess up and screw up the filter then buying a new one will probably wipe me out money wise (oh the joys of being in high school and having no money)also one or two other things. holy cow iron! that tanks beatiful! what have you got in it!?!?!im glad you couldnt resist a reply! well i just thought id say congrats on a beatiful setup. and callatya? well i really like the idea of beach sand. any tips on where to get it? costs or anything at all would be aprecciated. if i do decide on sand beach sand sounds perfect. thanks so much for all the replys guys.

The true test of character is not how much we know how to do, but how we behave when we dont know what to do.

Sand Question!

I plan on creating a Shellie tank, which requires sand! These gravels mentioned that would raise PH would actually be a good thing in this case, right? Should I actually look specifically for concrete sand or something like that?

Sorry to steal your thread, Sora!

Personally... I had sand in a 55g tank ages ago. I never had any problems with it. I had two yoyo loaches at the time, and they were fine with it. Their death came from jumping out of the hood, not the substrate. They grew up to somethin like 6" in that tank. All the other fish were fine in there too, and it never ruined my filter. I spent a LONG LONG LONG time rinsing out that sand though. I got the play sand from Home Depot, put it in a bucket, and rinsed it out with the hose constantly so that any smaller particles washed away. I was amazed at how long it took to get the water completely clear!

The pottery that growls!

Yep for shellies you do want ph raising substrate.

I'd still suggest keeping it fairly shallow, no 3" deep gravel bed. shellies

^_^

For shellies you don't do the 1" thing? I never thought of what depth!!! Which sand is good for raising PH and still being soft enough for them to stick their faces in it? =D Thanks!

The pottery that growls!

lol i dont care if you steal VCP. Oh i do have a question for you though! how exactly do you was out sand? i think i read somewhere you know its clean when the waters clear but i dont know how to clean it lol. please and thank you!

The true test of character is not how much we know how to do, but how we behave when we dont know what to do.

I put my sand in a pillow case and rinsed it in the bathtub for a while. When the water starts to run clear it's good enough to put in the tank. There will be some initial cloudiness but it will clear in a day or two, at least mine did.

Hi,
If you want to keep your pH up around 8, and use a sand,
I'd go with a product similiar to this:
http://www.aquarium-supply.co.uk/substrates.html
Keep the depth of the sand about an inch over all to
avoid pockets of anaerobic bacteria. The byproducts of
which are toxic to fish and plants.

Coral is a carbonate and it will increase your pH to 8
and hold it there.

Frank


-->>> The Confidence of Amateurs, is the Envy of Professionals <<<--

The shellies are the ones that ruined my filter. They took great delight in spitting the sand into and around the intake. I'd try to get a courser grain as it'd be less likely to get carried so far in the current, but should still allow them to spit and burrow. Either that or raise your intake right up like I have They seem to be causing less damage this way

I found the beach sand at my local Bunnings, so maybe somewhere like Home Depot, or a landscaping place? It was about $15AUD for 20kg bag (enough for a 55gal)

Oh, and on washing, soak it first. The dirt crusts on to the sand particles, if you soak for for a little while before you start rinsing, that softens and lifts, so you spend less time and water rinsing

For animals, the entire universe has been neatly divided into things to (a) mate with, (b) eat, (c) run away from, and (d) rocks. - Terry Pratchett

Thanks! I'll probably go with sand from the hardware store for my future shellies.

Do you think it'd help if I maybe placed some large rocks in front of the intake or something to prevent them from spitting sand around right next to the intake?

Sora... I put my sand in small batches into a large bucket and ran the hose through it. If it started to look like it was running clear, i'd shove the tip of the hose into the sand and stir it around. After a long time of running the water and stirring the sand out, it'd run clear.

The pottery that growls!