Beach sand

[murph]

I am really starting to lean toward using beach sand on my next aquarium project which hopefully will be 125g. I can use my kayak to paddle to some somewhat remote spoil islands on the west coast of FL where I can get some snow white sugar sand off dunes that are well above any bay water contact. The only water its seen in decades is rainwater.
I know the general consensus is that there is a risk of pollutants being introduced by doing this but I cant really see how in this case. Maybe I am missing something here.
Was wondering how many of you would contemplate this given the opportunity. There may be some question regarding legality but compared to what I usually see out there I can hardly believe taking three or four buckets of sand would even go notice by the FWC even if I did it right in front of there boat. I could always email them and ask.
edit; Forgot to mention that my access to mangrove seedlings is pretty much unlimited also. I am envisioning quite a fuge to be made out of my current 75 gallon tank.

 

[realnew]

The only thing I would suggest would be to contact FWC or a local university extension to see if they have conducted any water tests lately. I would hate to see what would happen if you introduced red tide into your tank. I would say that if you can find recent water test results to show nothing too scary in the water, then I would take wet sand.

 

[murph]

Well red tide is pretty much a given around here all year. I was thinking more along the lines of using the sand from the higher dunes that has not had contact with the water for years and seeding it with live sand from my fuge which will be five months old by then.
The whole thing will be an after the holidays project so I have plenty of time to think about it, in which I will probably change my mind several times, decide what to do and then wish I had done something else after the fact

 

[smoney]

Well, i put a little bit of beach sand in my 10 gallon tank, and it was to fine, it kicked up so much and made the water cloudy, but I dont know your sand may be better.

 

[dragonboy]

Well it work but you would have to clean the sand before you dump it into your tank and run it through many filter and let it cycle for 3 months just to be safe. But will work I've seen it done before just have to go through some cleaning of the sand.

 

[murph]

In 1987, Siesta Beach was judged "the World's Finest and Whitest" beach. Made from 99% pure quartz, the beach sand is soft, floury and cool to the touch.

[hr]
As told by one of our local web sites.
The areas I would be collecting this sand from have such a shallow draft that boaters can not access it, so me and maybe some fellow kayakers are probably the only ones to have set foot on it over many years. This stuff is literally as white as snow and as fine as sugar and stacked up 40 feet or more from the breakers if you could call them breakers, these islands are actually in the inter coastal waterway. From the aesthetics stand point alone it may be worth a try. It makes the overpriced argonite I can buy at the lfs look brown.
Since it will be a new tank setup I was thinking just screen it, wash it and in the tank it goes. Cycle it and.... hmmm, where did I put those Guinea pigs....errr I mean damsels. Woe is the life of the lowly damsel when it comes to this hobby. Maybe they deserve it for being as mean as they are.

 

[jer4916]

I'm from key biscayne, i used to swim out to lagoons and bring home new " toys " all the time...and by toys i hope you know what i mean. In reguards to sand your fine as long as you dont get it from like south beach or some place stupid like that, which it sounds like your not. Just make sure you boil the sand before you put it in your tank...then seed it like you said you were and you'll have no problems....in my old swf tank i used beach sand and it looked amazing.....looked like flower almost....anyways also sometimes down there you can find some good rock as well.....just make sure you find it as rubble ...not apart of somesort of actual rock structure....but that makes for good cheap rock as well. Also if your in the key's you have alot of lagoons....lots and lots of corals ....but shhhh
~Chris

 

[murph]

That would be a lot of sand to boil. Maybe a minute in the micro wave would achieve the same thing?? At least thats how they tell me to sterilize my nasty kitchen sponges

 

[judyk]

My son and I used beach sand in our tanks. No problem. We got it north of Daytona. One of the LFS there, sells sea water from the inlet. They just watch the newspaper for the bacteria count.