Was fine sand the biggest mistake?

[ReeferHunter]

Afternoon everyone,

When I started my 47 Gal Red Sea E-MAXX I purchased a fine sand that came wet with beneficial bacteria that I believe came from the Caribbean. Im beginning to think that was my biggest mistake yet as for scape. I constantly see sand all over my live rock and its really a nuisance. Also as you can see in the picture the wave maker is moving sand and throwing off all my sand bed. My problem is that I want to switch because I feel its really making the tank look poor. If I do this though it will require a full tank breakdown, removing fish, coral, live rock, and then switching sand. As hard as all this would be is it doable? What all do I need to know for doing this and can anyone help influence my decision?!

 

[EriksOasis]

I see a lot of people with fine sand personally never like it because of this and the sand sifters make a mess. I would recommend moving your powerhead before completely switching sand. But switching sand can be done it is a lot of work.

 

[domination2580]

Afternoon everyone,

When I started my 47 Gal Red Sea E-MAXX I purchased a fine sand that came wet with beneficial bacteria that I believe came from the Caribbean. Im beginning to think that was my biggest mistake yet as for scape. I constantly see sand all over my live rock and its really a nuisance. Also as you can see in the picture the wave maker is moving sand and throwing off all my sand bed. My problem is that I want to switch because I feel its really making the tank look poor. If I do this though it will require a full tank breakdown, removing fish, coral, live rock, and then switching sand. As hard as all this would be is it doable? What all do I need to know for doing this and can anyone help influence my decision?!

You could do it by water changes... every time just suck up sand with it until it's all gone. Then add the new

 

[Cherub]

Maybe add some course sand. The finer stuff should theoretically end up underneath

 

[ReefQueen]

Personally I like the fine sand over the coarser sand. I always had issues keeping the course sand white long term. I did have issues with it moving around at first, but now the only thing that moves the sand is my goby

 

[Nihilus]

I don't really like fine sand, but it can work... (one way or the other) There's plenty of horror stories with CC and dust...

 

[ReeferHunter]

You could do it by water changes... every time just suck up sand with it until it's all gone. Then add the new

smart

 

[User1]

I mixed CaribSea Pink Fiji which is pretty darn fine with CaribSea Florida which is a bit larger. I think it was 4 bags (40 lbs) of the thicker stuff with 2 40 lb bags of the Fiji. I didn't rinse anything, added the water pretty slow, over the rocks, and I have a very light haze. Nothing major, no clouds, and it is pretty much clear. All in all about 200 lbs of sand in the tank that is 30" tall.

 

[ReeferHunter]

Personally I like the fine sand over the coarser sand. I always had issues keeping the course sand white long term. I did have issues with it moving around at first, but now the only thing that moves the sand is my goby

what did you do to keep the sand from moving around? play with power head flow? I had a diamond goby that threw so much sand everywhere. he practically undermined all my live rock lol

 

[Cherub]

I love/hate my diamond goby. The best jerk in my tank

 

[ReeferHunter]

I love/hate my diamond goby. The best jerk in my tank

couldn't agree more lol love hate relationship. unfortunately I woke up to mine on the carpet. he jumped out

 

[Benga]

I did fine sand in my tank and had the same issue to where i would see the glass underneath. Eventually i added course sand ontop and it's helped the issue a lot more.

I intend on getting rid of the sand though before summer.

 

[skiergd011013]

Syphon out all the sand and go bare bottom. Never deal with nuisance sand again.

 

[Tommy's Reef]

I've done fine sand, thick sand, black sand and there is nothing better than no sand!!

 

[Injoynit]

I really like the fine sand look but as you know now it blows around. I added coarser sand to half of the tank towards the front and then crushed coral about 25% from the front of the glass.
This gives me fine in the back with coarse towards the front where the WAV's are aimed so no sand movement anywhere in the tank up to about 60% of the 2 wav maker pumps and that's a lot of water being pushed around at that percent.
This also lets me add some Jawfish which are my favorite. ;Woot

 

[ReefQueen]

what did you do to keep the sand from moving around? play with power head flow? I had a diamond goby that threw so much sand everywhere. he practically undermined all my live rock lol

I didn't really do anything, it just sort of figured itself out lol. I have a pink spotted and he is nice about not flinging sand everywhere, he just makes little piles here and there that flatten out within a few days. I do remember moving my sand back to the corners every day for the first few weeks after my current tank was set up. I say give it a few weeks and if you still are having issues then consider taking it all out.

 

[Jr'sReef]

I added crush coral to my problem areas and pretty much solved that issue. How old is the tank?

 

[GSPClown94]

On my old 55 gallon I had natures ocean 0.1-0.5 mm grain sand with a MP40 on one side and a MP10 on the other side. I only had an issue with sand being blown around if the MP40 was turned on full blast. Take some time to play around with the position of your powerheads and adjust the flow to see if you can find a nice balance of good flow without your tank becoming a snow globe. Hopefully this works, if not someone else mentioned siphoning out the old sand during water changes.

 

[BangedUp]

Afternoon everyone,

When I started my 47 Gal Red Sea E-MAXX I purchased a fine sand that came wet with beneficial bacteria that I believe came from the Caribbean. Im beginning to think that was my biggest mistake yet as for scape. I constantly see sand all over my live rock and its really a nuisance. Also as you can see in the picture the wave maker is moving sand and throwing off all my sand bed. My problem is that I want to switch because I feel its really making the tank look poor. If I do this though it will require a full tank breakdown, removing fish, coral, live rock, and then switching sand. As hard as all this would be is it doable? What all do I need to know for doing this and can anyone help influence my decision?!

I never go smaller than pink Fiji but as sand gets older it will become saturated with slime bacteria which helps keep it down, notnsure if it’s the same when you get to the finer stuff but I’m sire it will get better ..... if not you can switch, pain in butt but not impossible

 

[RELLIK-REEF]

Same story but thought I’d share. I first had fine Fiji sand in my 180 but it was always being blown around when the wave pumps kicked on so one day I added 40lbs of crushed coral and have not had a problem since. I never vacuum I just let the clean up crew do it’s thing and my top layer is almost always pretty white, not sparkling but white.good luck in whatever route you take. Happy reefing.