How long can sand sit?

[Gree23849]

I recently moved houses and put about 3 bucket fulls of sand in 5 gallon buckets with a layer of water to keep it wet. It has been about 2 weeks and I'm ready reset my tank up. They have been sitting in about 80 degree shade with lids. To what extend should I clean the sand to keep the inevitable ammonia spike manageable? - I was thinking puting the sand in the tank and filling it only enough to put some power heads in there to shift the sand and then refresh the water a couple times... it's a 300 gallon and I want to keep sand a minimal level..

 

[PatW]

I would expect the sand to harbor enough bacteria to convert Amoonia to nitrate in the time unless it had a bunch of detritus. But washing the sand throughly with tap water to remove anything looking like funk and then rinsing a couple of times with RODI or saltwater should do the trick.

 

[mann1139]

Ditto on rinsing the sand out. If nothing else, your sand should look 'clean' afterwards.