SOUTH DOWN PLAY SAND

[silkks11]

Who has used this? Does it work well? I recently bought 150lbs of it and I have it soaking in water as we speak, I'm very curious as to who has this sand in there tanks, and was it extremely cloudy when u added it? Please help b/c I would really like to know about it b/c I have a 250 gallon tank coming Sunday so I need to know if I"m going to be able to use this sand or have to buy bags and bags of live sand?
thanks a bunch

 

[chainsaw5vent]

i've got 150 lbs in my 125 and it works well. the biggest thing is the cost. out here in so cal. you're doing good if you can find it for $15 or less. you may need to "seed" it with another bag of live sand or live rock.

 

[a&m aggie 04']

you guys make me jealous. I hunted high and low for southdown in Tx w/ no luck. so instead of being able to build my DSB for $20, i got to pay over a hundred!!!!!!!!!!!Lucky Me
Mark

 

[silkks11]

ok great, thanks for all the great responses, actually I paid 4 bucks a bag of 50lbs, so if any really wants the stuff I"m sure we could work something out, especially if anyone has some caulerpa they wouldn't mind sending me

 

[silkks11]

also, I was wondering, since its so cloudy in the beginning will it be ok to add my fish the first day? I really have to be able to b/c I'm using all the water from my 90 gallon tank and the water from my 30 gallon, I was just hoping that they would be ok. I would be moving a 15in Panther Grouper, 8-9in Red Volitan Lion, and a 5-6in Huma huma trigger and a 5-6 Undulate trigger. These should be fine to move all in one day correct?

 

[javatech]

so what is the big deal with this sand i've seen things on the usernet about this

 

[bang guy]

The cloudy water will not bother your fish. the new tank will. I believe it would be a mistake to add any fish to a tank on day 1 or day 7 or even day 14.
IMO Southdown is great stuff. I have about 2500 pounds of it in my refugium and it's working beyond my hopes

 

[wrassecal]

I used it in my 55 gal and it will cloud up, mine looked like a milk vat for a couple days and slowly cleared as the sand bonded with the bacteria of the live rock and the live sand on top. I would not put your fish directly into a new tank, I would keep them in your 30 gal for a tank for a while. I did not soak or rinse my southdown so I don't know if that will cut down on the cloudiness,what kind of water is yours soaking in? It's nice of you to offer to send it to people but the truth is the shipping cost at that kind of weight makes it almost as expensive as buying the arogonite from the lfs.

 

[kelly]

I changed my 80 gallon over to Southdown at the end of May. It was crystal clear the next morning. Here is what I did.
I put 50# in a five gallon bucket, and put a hose in the bucket pushing it down to the bottom, and let the water slowly run, removing the scum off the top. Within about 10-15 minutes, the water was clear. I drained as much water out of the buck as I could by tilting it.
I put the sand in the tank, leveling it with each bucket full. After I put 250# in the tank, I covered it with 2 strips of aluminum foil making sure to cover all of it. I then put some of my live rock (small pieces) on the foil to keep it in place (along the edges, corners and down the middle where the foil over-lapped.) I then filled the tank half full of saltwater, removed the rock, and slowly removed the foil to keep it from disturbing the sand, and then added my rock and the rest of the saltwater.
I hope this helps.

 

[chainsaw5vent]

yo javatech! i saw your tank on the diy post. looks good! the thing about southdown is that it is made out of aragonite sand, and that IF you can get it from your local home depot on the east coast, it costs about $4.00/50 lb bag. compared to upwards of $30-$40 per 50 lb for the "official aquarium grade" sand. and sometimes you feel like a nut <img src="graemlins//urrr.gif" border="0" alt="[urrr]" /> when you found out that you just paid way too much for the exact same thing that comes in a different wrapper. so cal cost is about $15-16 a bag due to shipping costs. but it still is less than the "oag" stuff. <img src="graemlins//yeahright.gif" border="0" alt="[yeahright]" />

 

[javatech]

Thanks . i'll have to see if i can find some in the midwest if i have to i'll fly to the east and bring some back in a suitcase same price as lfs but at least i get a trip out of it ;-)
Originally posted by chainsaw5vent:
<strong>yo javatech! i saw your tank on the diy post. looks good! the thing about southdown is that it is made out of aragonite sand, and that IF you can get it from your local home depot on the east coast, it costs about $4.00/50 lb bag. compared to upwards of $30-$40 per 50 lb for the "official aquarium grade" sand. and sometimes you feel like a nut <img src="graemlins//urrr.gif" border="0" alt="[urrr]" /> when you found out that you just paid way too much for the exact same thing that comes in a different wrapper. so cal cost is about $15-16 a bag due to shipping costs. but it still is less than the "oag" stuff. <img src="graemlins//yeahright.gif" border="0" alt="[yeahright]" /> </strong><hr></blockquote>

 

[jakob4001]

yep, you are going to want to take your time w/ setting up the new tank; KEEP EVERYTHING live where it is now...hte large tank will take time to cycle; simply using existing water from current tank WILL NOT SKIP the cycling phase of a new tank; possibly adding ALL/MOST of your LR & maybe putting in a few shrimp from grocer may help speed things up though...

 

[rogeta]

Wrassecal, Where did you get your Southdown...i've called around and i can't find any...just curious...cause its what i would like to use..

 

[wrassecal]

I got the Norman Home Depot to ship it in from a Home Depot on the East coast, big hassle and I had to pay extra for shipping costs. Southdown told me they were getting a national contract with Ace Hardware and that the play sand should be availabe there nationwide this summer. I haven't checked at Ace to see but it's not a place I would have thougth of you might check if you have an Ace near you.

 

[rogeta]

Thanks Wrassecal...i'll try and call there tomorrow...again thanks alot...i really didn't want to use anything other than southdown
~Rocco~