Help With Milky Fog From Sand

[TysFish]

I’m facing an issue in my Marineland 40 breeder. I have 40 lbs of dry aragonite and 10 lbs of live aragonite sand in the tank. I washed the dry aragonite several times before adding it, but whenever I touch the sand even lightly, it still kicks up a ton of milky fog.

I’m planning to keep a Peacock Mantis Shrimp, and I know they like to dig and move sand constantly. I’m worried that once he’s in there, it’ll cloud the whole tank every time he digs.

Right now, I have two live rocks in the tank and nothing else—it’s just started cycling.

If anyone has experience with this, I’d really appreciate advice on how to get the fine dust under control before adding the mantis.

My current plan is to stir the sand daily to bring up as much silt as possible, run my filter with Poly-Fil to catch it, then rinse the Poly-Fil and repeat until eventually I can stir the sand without it clouding up.

Does this sound reasonable? Has anyone tried this approach or have a better idea to stabilize the sand?

Thanks so much for any help!

 

[Fish Fan]

I replied to your other post before I saw this one. It might be best to reply to this thread to help keep all the answers in one place:
https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/help-with-milky-fog-from-sand.1120064/

 

[mpatterson42]

I think your plan is good but I would replace the PolyFil each time rather than just rinsing. This will probably slow your cycle because you'll be tossing beneficial bacteria but just rinsing it out will do the same.

Do you have anywhere in your setup where you can use a polishing pad or filter floss?