Should have listened to my girlfriend, am I screwed now?

[mixtimp]

My girl, who knows absolutely nothing about fish tanks, told me to put the live sand in first, then add the water. Well, I'm a damn idiot, b/c I now how my 75 gallon tank filled, salt mixed in, the salinity is right at xx24.
Can I pour he sand in the tank with the water already in it? I know it is going to look like a -#$# storm, but will the sand settle and water be clear again, or did I completely f' it up?

 

[larrynews]

if there is nbothing in it i dont know why you couldn't ...it will take a while for the sand to settle but no harm should be done...again if nothing is in it....

 

[mixtimp]

The tank is empty. Just a tank and water. I'll turn the powerheads off and let it go, I just wanted to make sure it wasn't going to ruin all the saltwater that is in there now.

 

[farmboy]

If it is playsand(dead), you can sort of rinse it first. Mine had a lot of "dust" in it and rinsing it a few times helped minimize the initial "sand storm." We use a 1 gallon bucket and filled it 1/2 full of sand. THen ran water in it and kind of stirred it around - dumping the milky looking water off of it. We never got it completely clean but it did help it a lot.
If ya got live sand-just dump it in.

 

[danedodger]

In my experience it doesn't matter if you add water to the sand or sand to the water, the sand is going to get all stirred up whirling all around the tank for a bit anyway. Larry's right, go ahead and add it. It won't harm anything. Just check all your filter media at least daily if not twice a day, rinse the dust off it, put it back in, and wait for the dust to settle.

 

[benter]

drill a few small holes in some kind of tupperware container lid..put the sand in the container , as full as you can , put the lid back on and slowly sink the bowl to the bottom and remove the lid carefully..I have done this in the past and it will cut down on "the storm" quite a bit..

 

[ricks280]

does not matter , just give it time.
what goes up must come down. it will clear up in a week. just do this=

(rick)

 

[thomas712]

At this point it doesn't matter, however please remember that you will be displacing water volum by adding sand. You will need to remove 5-10 gallons of water so that you don't wind up spilling the water over the tank edge by adding the sand. Then add back the amount of water you need to fill it back up. Same thing happens when you add rock to an established tank.
Thomas

 

[snailheave]

if i were you, i would remove enough water so the water level is below the teeth of the overflow so the particles don't go over.