Adding Live Sand to a cycled tank

blondenaso1

blondenaso1

Member
My girlfriends tank has been up and running for about 2 months now and is nice and cycled. It started out as a fish only tank but has been slowely progressing more to a reef tank. It has only 20lbs of LR in it now. We started out with gravel substrate, but I would like to add live sand. My question is would it be ok to add live sand now without worrying about a nitrate spike or throwing any of the other parameters out of wack? We have a Blonde Naso and a Yellow Tang in the tank and I don't want anything to happen to them.
I was thinking to add the sand, watch the water parameters, and do a water change after a week to be safe. How does that sound? Is it also ok to add the LS over the gravel?
 
marine fanatic

marine fanatic

Member
I started out with CC and after my tank cycled I decided I wanted LS instead for cosmetic purposes as well as bacteria advantages. I would suggest that if you want to convert, do only a small section at a time, like 1/5 or 1/4 to minimize any spikes. I took a month to completely convert my reef tank from CC to LS and I had no problems with the inhabitants.
Hope it helps you ;)
 
mr . salty

mr . salty

Active Member
If you are planning on using LIVE SAND,not dry sand,Then you can add as much as you want.Even take out the CC and replace it all with LIVE SAND with NO recycle.Good LIVE SAND has all the bacteria allready in it,so cycling is not needed....Also,you SHOULD replace the gravel with the sand.Not add the sand too it.The gravel will eventually work it's way to the top,not only looking bad,but defeating the purpose of having a sand bed...
 
coralfishg

coralfishg

Member
unfortunatly i am learning the hard way. i just added 120 pounds of live sand to my 75 gallon tank. and 45 pounds of live rock. my tank is now cycling again. and all of my corals are diying. so far my fish really haven't shown any sign's of stress. I really cannot tell you that it was the sand because i added the rock to. i think it was because i added so much at once. my best advise for you is to take it slow. I was excited about getting everything in my tank, and i rushed. now everything is dying. good luck and keep us posted :)
 
mr . salty

mr . salty

Active Member
I'll bet it was the ROCK,not the sand.If too much uncured rock is added to any tank a recycle will occure.This is from the excessive die'off from the rock causing elivated ammonia..Good sand,and cured live rock will not cause this problem...
 
fish tank

fish tank

Member
in my 75 i had 60# of CC and then wanted LS and LR no fish yet so i took the tank back down and started over it was well worth it.
 
blondenaso1

blondenaso1

Member
The tank has been up and running for a while. I don't want the hassle of going through all that again. I think i'll go with Mr. Salty's idea and siphon out all the CC and replace it with LS. How much LS should I add?
 
marine fanatic

marine fanatic

Member
I did what MR SALTY suggested by taking out ALL the CC and replaced it with LS. I did notice however that after I put in the first batch of LS, my water clouded up a bit and it seemed like it did a very brief cycle but I had no problems during the process. I have a 55 and I placed 60 lbs. of LS in it, not sure if that is an average amount but it gave me a nice 2" deep sandbed and it looks 10 times better than it did with CC. I currently have just a few pounds of Fiji LR and I want to add around 4-5 pounds every 2 weeks until I reach around 50-60 pounds total. I hope that is the correct way to do it but any suggestions would be appreciated.
 
blondenaso1

blondenaso1

Member
I added the LS. Other then the Tang being scared to death and hiding in his little cave everything went fine. I did have a little NH4 before I put the LS in. We'll see how the water is in a couple days.
 
cyslyde

cyslyde

Member
MY LFS set me up with a plenum system... I have a few spots that could use more sand, can you add sand in small amounts to this too? is there anything I should watch for if i do?
thanx
 
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