how to safley change your live sand in an established 60 gallon reef tank.

[tjkasanchez]

I have a 1.5 year old 60 gallon reef tank that needs to have the sand removed and replaced with a larger grained sand, because the original sand is to sandy and just blows around. I wanted to know what would be the safest way for the live stock?

 

[JC1977]

I have a 1.5 year old 60 gallon reef tank that needs to have the sand removed and replaced with a larger grained sand, because the original sand is to sandy and just blows around. I wanted to know what would be the safest way for the live stock?

The main thing to avoid is removing it all at once. Just siphon out a portion at a time over a pro longed period to be safe. Adding extra bio media during this process will be a good fail safe to counteract the nitrifying bacteria you’ll lose.

 

[tjkasanchez]

Thank you..

 

[Borat]

i removed DT sand in one go (not adding it back in) - it had no effect on anyone or anything whatsoever. i had sugar sand - by description it is similar to yours. The tank is SPS (90%).

now the tank is bare bottom - i no longer have to contol phosphates (other than trying to keep it from falling too low)

 

[tjkasanchez]

Thank you