Cloudy water due to sand

[Tasha93x]

Today I changed my tank from gravel to sand to accommodate my weather loach. However I'm having the problem of very cloudy water, even though I did rinse sand - through have read this often happens.
I'm concerned about my fish though as they have had to be returned to their cloudy tank as I have nowhere else to keep them and my loach was getting stressed in the temporary, much smaller tank. Just wondering if my fish will be ok living in the cloudy tank until it settles? They seems perfectly happy but don't want to take a chance.
Thanks

 

[reefdiver]

You will see cloudiness for at least 12 hours. I personally dont think it will be bad since you have to stir your sand up every once in a while to prevent toxic bags of gas forming in your substrate.

 

[Tasha93x]

Thank you for replying! It's been about 4 hours or so now and the slowly visability is improving so fingers crossed it clears soon.
Also, I've heard that having a fish that burrows in the sand(i have my loach) prevents toxic bags of gas forming do you know if that's true? Should I stir it anyway to be on the safe side?

 

[Mark Hewitt]

Thank you for replying! It's been about 4 hours or so now and the slowly visability is improving so fingers crossed it clears soon.

Yeah, that'll happen with sand, mine took about 2 days to disappear completely, but it did! Just remember that once it's clean give your filter a good rinse out to get rid of the sand particles, they got everywhere with me, which is why for my new tank I've used small gravel instead!

Also, I've heard that having a fish that burrows in the sand(i have my loach) prevents toxic bags of gas forming do you know if that's true? Should I stir it anyway to be on the safe side?

Loaches / catfish etc will just skim along the top really. If you do want it stirred up you'll need snails really. Or as you say with the end of a wooden spoon once a week, but carefully!

 

[Tasha93x]

Thanks Mark i'll give it a careful stir And yup tank has improved so much overnight still a little bit cloudy but getting there!

 

[BillD]

Why not remove all the water and replace? That will remove much of the silt once and for all.

 

[Tasha93x]

Why not remove all the water and replace? That will remove much of the silt once and for all.

Hm I was considering doing that earlier today but it's almost totally clear now so I'm pretty happy with how it's going Thank you very much for the reply tho !

 

[Mark Hewitt]

Replacing the water will probably just stir it up even more! No reason why you can't do a partial change to catch particles that won't go out of suspension.

 

[happygirl65]

It always gets a little cloudy on water changes and since you just added it for the first time I would expect it to take a couple days to settle out. Fish will be fine in there in the meantime.

 

[Tasha93x]

Okay cheers, I'll leave it as it is just now and do a partial water change in a few days. I'd say visability was about 95% now! happy times!
Thanks for your help everybody

 

[BillD]

If it clouds every water change, than, it isn't clean. My tank with sand never clouds.

 

[Mark Hewitt]

If it clouds every water change, than, it isn't clean. My tank with sand never clouds.

+1. My tank was cloudy when I first put the sand in, but water changes didn't cloud it up. Unless of course I just threw the bucket of water in which disturbed the sand on the bottom.

I haven't used sand for my new tank, too much hassle.

 

[dkpate]

Make sure you check your filter impeller when it clears, to make sure there is no sand in there. Nothing will burn a filter up faster than a stuck impeller!

 

[Mark Hewitt]

Make sure you check your filter impeller when it clears, to make sure there is no sand in there. Nothing will burn a filter up faster than a stuck impeller!

+1. The main reason I now don't use sand is that it gets into everything! Water change buckets, filters, underwater air pumps, you name it and sand is in it! I'm pretty sure it knackered up one of my internal filters too.

I now use a shaley gravel with individual stones about 1mm across, small enough so that the catfish are happy but large enough not to be held in suspension for very long, so won't get sucked into the filter, and if they are they won't make it as far as the impeller.