Black Substrate - pros/cons and photos?

lawrencechancy · Jun 27, 2017

mine 75 gallon

John kennington · Jun 27, 2017

My current tank is a mix of both black sand. I love it. Adds a nice color contest.

Klcan · Jun 27, 2017

Jd120988 said:
My mag float loves to pick up the sand lol I guess I have bad luck

Mine does too...it's not just you

whotzler · Jun 27, 2017

My First tank when it was still young. Loved the Hawaiian Black. Be careful I found two different substrates with the exact same brand. One is shiny gloss black with lots of white flakes as seen in this pic. When I upgraded to a larger tank I order 4 more bags of the exact same brand to replace sand, and it was more charcoal black with reddish hints and few white flakes. I do not like as much, see pic below.

GillsGoneWild · Jun 27, 2017

Jd120988 said:
Also want to add i believe the biggest downfall of the black substrates is that they are metallic so if you get too close to the substrate with your glass cleaner it picks up bits of the gravel and can severely scratch your glass as you make passes with the cleaner.... my glass was perfect before hawaiian black sand. Idk if this was mentioned at all and the op sounds set on the substrate they want. I'm not here to change minds just passing along my experience with the product.

^^^^ This!!!
I have two of my tanks with the CaribSea black Hawaiian sand and if I had it to do over again I wouldn't use it simply because of the magnetic properties of some of the grains. We absolutely love the look of this sand -- Rock flower anemones just explode with color -- but I don't like the scratch potential. YMMV.

Klcan · Jun 27, 2017

I have a mixture of black substrate in my tank. One is the black Hawaiian sand but I forget what the other sand is that I used. It looks alright; it different from what you normally see. The only issue I have had is that my mag cleaner picks up the sand if I'm not careful. As far as my water parameters I haven't had a problem in the three years that the tank has been up. Please excuse the pic I haven't been able to do much to the tank due to some health issues I have had to take care of

Purpletank · Jun 27, 2017

I've never posted here so sorry if this doesn't turn out well. I have always had Black Hawaiian substrate and love it. I haven't found it to be "chunky"I would say it's a happy medium between fine sand and crushed Coral. I have had no problems with it producing micro fauna and love that I can see all the little brittle stars working away but the "nasty algae" doesn't show up. (not

samnaz said:
Who here has used black sand? Particularly either of these types:

Hawaiian Black (0.25 - 3.0 mm)

Indo-pacific Black (0.25 - 5.0 mm)

I am thinking about creating a tank with a Lembah Strait/Sulewsi Indonesia theme. The sand there is mucky, black and made up of volcanic matter.

I know the main issues with black sand are the lack of buffering abilities, as they are not calcium based. Has anyone every tried mixing it with some calcium based substrate? I was thinking about mixing it with some of the Caribsea Special Grade Reef Sand, to provide some calcium buffering.

Another issue is the grain size which has a wide range, up to 5.0 mm which is much too large. Could I use a strainer to sort out the extra large grains?

If you have used black sand in your tank, POST A PIC! I want to see what it actually looks like in real life.

M

samnaz said:
Who here has used black sand? Particularly either of these types:

Hawaiian Black (0.25 - 3.0 mm)

Indo-pacific Black (0.25 - 5.0 mm)

I am thinking about creating a tank with a Lembah Strait/Sulewsi Indonesia theme. The sand there is mucky, black and made up of volcanic matter.

I know the main issues with black sand are the lack of buffering abilities, as they are not calcium based. Has anyone every tried mixing it with some calcium based substrate? I was thinking about mixing it with some of the Caribsea Special Grade Reef Sand, to provide some calcium buffering.

Another issue is the grain size which has a wide range, up to 5.0 mm which is much too large. Could I use a strainer to sort out the extra large grains?

If you have used black sand in your tank, POST A PIC! I want to see what it actually looks like in real life.

nbagnardi · Jun 27, 2017

i love my black sand, coming up on 2 years old and the only thought i've had was going bare bottom cause i want to up my flow and go SPS dominant. it is mildly magnetic and will stick to a magnetic cleaner and i do struggle with PH but i run a dual co2 scrubber to combat that. any questions, feel free to ask.

trevormass7 · Jun 27, 2017

Just set up my second black sand tank, I love how it looks

Bruce Burnett · Jun 28, 2017

Keepswiming said:
I used this stuff on two of my tanks. I do not believe that it has "enhanced buffering abilities". My sps tank is have issues with PH lately because I have to run the AC all day because it is 110 degrees out here! It drops to 7.6 at night sometimes!

Trade our 120 degrees for your 110 degrees

Karie · Jun 28, 2017

I have Hawaiian black in my tank and have had it for about 6 yrs now. My tank is acrylic and I do have scratches from catching the rock while cleaning. --I don't use the magnetic cleaner much because I am worried about catching the sand/gravel. Honestly I didn't realize some was magnetic probably because I try to avoid the sand bed so carefully. My mag is wrapped in one of those white net things (I never remember what they are called) so I always assumed the net thing was catching the gravel and scratching my acrylic.-- The Hawaiian black is between 2mm and 4mm mostly and some pieces will be reddish brown mixed with the black. It doesn't show near as much junk on the bottom, algae, etc as my white sand tank but I admit I vacuum it every week or every other week. I have a deep sand bed and lots of nasties come out when I vacuum. I have been able to have melanarus, yellow coris, and other burying wrasses with no problem but I never tried anything else that buries. I have a sand dollar in my white sand tank and I am not willing to rehome it in the Hawaiian black tank as it seems to coarse.

I have to admit, I seem to have a hard time with clams in my tank. My LFS told me they thought it was because of the low light mentioned above. I have 2 radions on my tank at 60% but the black absorbs the light, so that tank seems less lit than the white sand tank. Can't prove it but its possible I guess.

I have had a crushed coral tank which I didn't care for, the white sand tank which I always have to stir the sand in so it is not dirty looking, and finally my Hawaiian black. I am building a new 100 and am contemplating bare bottom or Tahitian black sand which is finer than the Hawaiian. I definitely like the clean look of the black sand but the tank does look dark. But your corals and your fish stand out amazingly.

Good Luck

Keepswiming · Jun 28, 2017

Bruce Burnett said:
Trade our 120 degrees for your 110 degrees

Yikes! Are you having Ph issues from running the AC all day also?

Bob Escher · Jun 28, 2017

I had black sand in my freshwater tank and I liked it but since I've never seen black sand on a beach ( I'm not saying it doesn't exist I've just never seen it in my travels)
I went to regular white sand on my saltwater build

tcampbell23 · Jun 28, 2017

I just took the black sand out of my tank a couple of weeks ago. While black sand does provide a nice color contrast, I found that it made the tank seem really dark in conjunction with a black back wall. Once I made the switch to white sand I wondered why I ever had black to begin with. The novelty of it kind of wore of IMO. My experience with it was pleasurable, however. I used tahitan black mood sand and could not have been happier with the performance. I just got over the drab look.

Dragon52 · Jun 28, 2017

I've used Carib-sea Black sand in a 120 gl for 3 yrs & put in my 185gal that I setup in Feb. I had used the white yrs before & agree it shows way to much junk, I try to keep a good cleanup crew to get rid of excess food & other things.

samnaz · Jun 28, 2017

domination2580 said:
This is interesting. I have the Hawaiian black sand and so far not much detritus on top and np issues with magnetism from the flipper.

Jd120988 said:
Maybe I just received a highly metallic batch or my magnet is very powerful idk. What I do know is it never fails if I go just a hair too close to the substrate it sucks up bits of the gravel like a vacuum.

What kind of magnets are you guys using? I have a mag float with scraper, as well as a Flipper.