Rock and sand questions

[JenniferMcK]

i have a 30 gal setup sith 20 lbs of live rock from kp aquatics. I ordered a small amount bc i wasn't sure I'd be happy with the rock or. I am very happy but I want to add more rock. So ordered 25 lbs of dry rock from bulkreefsupply. How to I go about adding the new rock? Do I add it at once or one rock at a time? Also I have a very fine sand and it looks horrible. It's collecting on my rocks anytime I do water changes and gravel vacs. It makes my water cloudy. I want to change the sand to a less fine sand maybe the instant ocean special grade. How do I go about that as well. There are no fish in there yet. But I have a few hitchhikers that came with the kp aquatics rocks, a big starfish some white bug looking things, a bunch of brittle starfish. I also do have a small cuc of about 2 hermits and 5 snails. Tank has been cycled for about a month so will adding rock and changing sand cause a mini cycle? I want to have a really good rockscape for the things I want to put in there eventually.

 

[saltyfilmfolks]

No , adding sand or dry Rock won’t cause a mini cycle.
That’s when ammoina is introduced from die off and stirring stuff up. In such a young tank you probably don’t have enough built up to do that. You can use prime or a bottle of bacteria to help stop anything that would.

I think you can pretty safely just add dry rock to the tank.

 

[ndrwater]

You can add the dry dock all at once. Shouldn't be an issue. As for the sand, I would remove maybe half at a time, or... All at once using the gravel vac. There is a good possibility that you will have some sort of mini cycle due to the sand being removed. Being that the tank is as new as it is, now would be the time to get this stuff done..

 

[JenniferMcK]

No , adding sand or dry Rock won’t cause a mini cycle.
That’s when ammoina is introduced from die off and stirring stuff up. In such a young tank you probably don’t have enough built up to do that. You can use prime or a bottle of bacteria to help stop anything that would.

I think you can pretty safely just add dry rock to the tank.

Thank you for the info!

 

[JenniferMcK]

You can add the dry dock all at once. Shouldn't be an issue. As for the sand, I would remove maybe half at a time, or... All at once using the gravel vac. There is a good possibility that you will have some sort of mini cycle due to the sand being removed. Being that the tank is as new as it is, now would be the time to get this stuff done..

Thanks for the advice! I also thought getting it done sooner rather than later would be a good idea, but I just wanted to be sure. I'm going to gravel vac half at a time like you suggested. The sand is just making my tank look horrible and my rocks look like they've been snowed on