Best substrate for the money? ?

[vetteguy53081]

I use Caribsea live sand with bacteria culture. Have multiple tanks and NO issues

 

[HB AL]

I would save your money and use the savings on something else for the tank. I have no idea what kind of sand I have but never really thought about it.

 

[choss]

i love tropic eden.

+1 - meso flakes are awesome

 

[Todvod]

I’m setting up my first tank and just finished rincing TE Mini flakes. It is beautiful sand. Where are you located? Maybe make a day trip to Premium Aquatics and bring some extra back for your buddies to share the cost.

 

[JoshH]

I’m setting up my first tank and just finished rincing TE Mini flakes. It is beautiful sand. Where are you located? Maybe make a day trip to Premium Aquatics and bring some extra back for your buddies to share the cost.

I live in Calgary Alberta Canada lol it would be quite the trip and I'd have to pay the boarder fees and taxes anyway when I crossed the boarder

 

[JasPR]

I use Eden ( 5 years now) and I use two grades, the very fine sugar sand and the next grain up. IT IS BEAUTIFUL ! It moves around at the slightest current, no big deal as aqua-scaping can reduce that effect. BUT it is also a maintenance nightmare. If you feed heavily ( I'm talking fish tank) the red algae will spread wildly unless you do weekly water changes of 20-30%. And forget a python cleaning of the sand-- it will all be sucked out. And if you rinse it and reintroduce it, you WILL get an ammonia spike. From minor to wipe out depending. I'd go with a larger grain or flake if I were you. I know I'm slowly changing over with every vacuuming of my 4 systems.

 

[brandon429]

We have ways to 100% stop any ammonia spike from rinsing, 100% of the time. thats important to know so that no hesitation exists for those who want to get into the bed for whatever reason...moving homes, upgrades downgrades etc

In our sand rinse thread, we're getting digital monitoring of ammonia now up to the hundred-thousandths measuring the process from sand removal and rinses, its 100% accurate/no ammonia. there's a certain order of ops required to attain this. name brand of sand never matters to the skip cycle process, only procedure.

 

[JasPR]

well that would be interesting to read as I just lost 1 regal angel ( two years with me), 3 bicolor angels and a flame angel in a 135 gallon tank because I put washed, rinse and dried sand back into the tank.

 

[brandon429]

here's our roadmap to not lose them, curious to know what differed. we're out to 23 pages lost one goby only. can't be tied to the rinse imo

Official Sand Rinse and Tank Transfer thread

If you are reading this thread to cure a tank invasion from a link I sent you, we do not need to identify your type of invasion here we do not need you to test anything at anytime regarding nitrate, phosphate etc Above all, we do not need to see a microscope slide picture of your invasion at...

www.reef2reef.com

did you rinse your bed in tap water before setting it back up? Nearly everyone on the planet would say no. Ironically, that's what makes our rinse thread never have losses. admit that's weird, rinse your sand in tap and your fish live, do it without tap water as a limited rinse using prepped water (to try and save bac, which they don't need our help) and the fish die because the rinsed sand could not pass a drop test. There's not enough made water to rinse an active bed with; it'll run out long before tap. Tap allows two hours rinsing if that's what it takes to pass a drop test (where the bed is disturbed on video, for proof we can see it was thorough rinsed)

did you have a video of the post rinsed sand, to show if it was clearly rinsed? If it was, then the fish loss isn't related to sand rinsing as 100% rinse = 100% no ammonia produced.

the bacteria in a sandbed don't matter, you can instantly remove them without harm in any reef and rocks take over, instantly. we think most losses associated with sandbed access come from trying to preserve the sandbed bacteria/under rinsing.

*if fish cannot handle being acclimated from holding containers back and forth that may have a role, but the trip home from LFS is usually worse so this is just a guess.

 

[AdamB]

Hey everyone, I've given a lot of thought to the appropriate substrate for my new build and am stuck. Tropic Eden seems to be the top of the game but in my situation (My location) one 30lb bag rounds out to $130 CDN with shipping. I'd like to hear from others and there experience's to weigh in on my decision, is it worth the money? or is it worth going with a regular brand of sand and dealing with any pitfalls that may come with that?

I really like this nature’s ocean no.0 white sand and wished I had found it for my first tank instead. Comes from ocean and it has nice color and buffering properties.

 

[JasPR]

here's our roadmap to not lose them, curious to know what differed. we're out to 23 pages lost one goby only. can't be tied to the rinse imo

Official Sand Rinse and Tank Transfer thread

If you are reading this thread to cure a tank invasion from a link I sent you, we do not need to identify your type of invasion here we do not need you to test anything at anytime regarding nitrate, phosphate etc Above all, we do not need to see a microscope slide picture of your invasion at...

www.reef2reef.com

did you rinse your bed in tap water before setting it back up? Nearly everyone on the planet would say no. Ironically, that's what makes our rinse thread never have losses. admit that's weird, rinse your sand in tap and your fish live, do it without tap water as a limited rinse using prepped water (to try and save bac, which they don't need our help) and the fish die because the rinsed sand could not pass a drop test. There's not enough made water to rinse an active bed with; it'll run out long before tap. Tap allows two hours rinsing if that's what it takes to pass a drop test (where the bed is disturbed on video, for proof we can see it was thorough rinsed)

did you have a video of the post rinsed sand, to show if it was clearly rinsed? If it was, then the fish loss isn't related to sand rinsing as 100% rinse = 100% no ammonia produced.

the bacteria in a sandbed don't matter, you can instantly remove them without harm in any reef and rocks take over, instantly. we think most losses associated with sandbed access come from trying to preserve the sandbed bacteria/under rinsing.

*if fish cannot handle being acclimated from holding containers back and forth that may have a role, but the trip home from LFS is usually worse so this is just a guess.

I did the following-- removed sand from tank via normal python vacuuming. Then the catching vat was drained into waste leaving the sand ( about 10 pounds, as it is a 135 gallon aquarium)/ I rinsed the sand with very hot water from the tap and dumped it to waste-- three times. I then took the sand in the vat outside and rinsed it three more times with a garden hose. Blasting it with high pressure and then dumping the water 3 times into the garden. I then allowed it to bake outside in the sun until dry. And I returned it to the tank the following weekend. Everything dead in the morning - total wipe out

 

[brandon429]

The only detail that veers from our work there was the removal part. We never remove with water in the tank it’s always drain off water first and remove sensitives before pulling up sand. Not sure if that matters above but it stands out as a procedural variance.

The hot tap didn’t hurt anything, we replace entire sandbeds all at once there so tap/heat/dry certainly doesn’t hurt for the reused sand.