Live or Not Live?
- Thread starter joshr
- Start date
joshr
Member
Originally Posted by Tbone38
http:///forum/post/2540953
You can buy some live sand and "seed" the playground variety. When I set up my 125, they (the LFS) said you could split it up 1/3 live sand to 2/3 non. The more live sand the more bacteria...so the faster the cycle.
What do you mean faster the cycle?
http:///forum/post/2540953
You can buy some live sand and "seed" the playground variety. When I set up my 125, they (the LFS) said you could split it up 1/3 live sand to 2/3 non. The more live sand the more bacteria...so the faster the cycle.
What do you mean faster the cycle?
jawdubb
Member
This is all your choice. I ended up using crushed aragonite sand from home depot then I found 5 fellow reefers in my area and asked for a cup full of sand from each of their tanks to get the bacteria and start some bio-diversity. As to speeding up the cycle if you buy live sand that already has bacteria you do not have to wait for it to grow into the sand. But IMO that is debatable.
mr_x
Active Member
i agree with jawdub.
don't waste your money on the "live sand" they sell in bags. the dry sand will become live soon enough.
you can start the cycle with a piece of raw shrimp if you like.
personally, i'd leave the sand out for now. add my live rock, cure it..vacuum out all the nastys that will fall off of it onto the tank botom, and THEN add my dead sand. it will be live before you know it.
a good question for you-
how deep of a sand bed are you talking about?
if it's only 1 or 2 inches for aesthetics, then don't bother worrying about it coming live. you are not going to get any filtration benefits from it being that shallow anyway.
if you are considering a DSB, then it should be 4" or more, and i would still buy a cup of sand from a local reefer rather than purchase that bag-live stuff.
it's a common misconception that that sand is full of critters too. it's only got a small amount of bacteria in it. no pods or anything like that. you can add your own bacteria easily and cheaply.
don't waste your money on the "live sand" they sell in bags. the dry sand will become live soon enough.
you can start the cycle with a piece of raw shrimp if you like.
personally, i'd leave the sand out for now. add my live rock, cure it..vacuum out all the nastys that will fall off of it onto the tank botom, and THEN add my dead sand. it will be live before you know it.
a good question for you-
how deep of a sand bed are you talking about?
if it's only 1 or 2 inches for aesthetics, then don't bother worrying about it coming live. you are not going to get any filtration benefits from it being that shallow anyway.
if you are considering a DSB, then it should be 4" or more, and i would still buy a cup of sand from a local reefer rather than purchase that bag-live stuff.
it's a common misconception that that sand is full of critters too. it's only got a small amount of bacteria in it. no pods or anything like that. you can add your own bacteria easily and cheaply.
