Adding live sand to established tank

[cristine]

I'd like to replace all of the sand in my 12 gal nano with new live sand. The old sand is a mix of crushed coral and sand and the tank is about 18 months old. My plan is to carefully remove all LR, corals, and fish and put them in a large bucket, then once the tank is empty, remomve all the sand. Can I then add the new LS (CaribSea Arag-Alive), then place the LR, corals, and fish back in the tank and not have to worry about a mini cycle? I'd also like to add some base rock from an old freshwater tank (I've boiled it

) as a base for the LR I already have in there. I'd place that rock on the bottom and put my pretty LR on top of that. Does that sound resonable or am I asking for trouble

?
Thanks

Cris

 

[clay12340]

Any time you mess with sand it is a nightmare in my opinion. Just plan to let the stuff sit in the buckets for a while as the sand will probably take a day or two to settle. You should also keep a handful or so of the old sand in the tank and if you find any little worms and such in the old sand toss them in the new stuff.

 

[reef diver]

No dont do this, you mus replace it in sections, vaccum away a section, put aq piece of plastic in it to divide it off, add a bit of new sand, then do this once per qweek until the whole bed is clean, otherwise you risk a cycle.

 

[cristine]

Thanks for the replies

. I guess there is just no easy way to do this. When you say vacuum out a section, do you recommend say 1/5, 1/10, 1/4, or ? for a 12 gallon nano? I was hoping to reconfigure my rock at the same time beause I'm unhappy with how it looks now that I've added some things over the months. Should I do that later, after the sand has been completely replaced? Or, there isn't a lot of sand at the bottom of the tank right now, what if I just added to it? How would I do that? Then there is still the changing of the rock configuration to deal with

.
Thanks
Cris

 

[coral keeper]

I asked the same question and everyone told me on my thread it will not cycle the tank.