Sand Substrate

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chrisjg04

Aquarium Advice Activist
Joined
Sep 23, 2008
Messages
109
Location
Orlando, Florida
Hey all

I have a 2.5g tank in my apartment at school and want to change the substrate to a white sand to be able to plant the tank and rescape it nicer. The size of the tank does not call for a lot of sand and the only small bags I can find are Carib Sea live sand for saltwater tanks, would this be fine to put in there?
 
You can go to lowes or home depot and buy a bag of play sand, its like 3 bux for a fifty pound bag. Of course you wouldn't need that much, but it's probaby cheaper than buying the sand from the pet store.

I wouldn't use the live sand. If it is indeed live, you will have a die off which will mess your water parameters up. It could also have buffering materials in it which will spike your ph and total hardness. (Im not a saltie, just the limited amount I know regarding it, someone correct this if it is wrong.)
 
I was worried about the die off, I hadn't considered the buffering materials though, you are probably right there.

I just wish I could find play sand or pool filter sand in smaller quantities.
 
I use the Quickrete Premium Playsand from home depot. I got it for $3.48 for a 50lb bag. Like the others said, it is way more than you need but it will still be cheaper than buying say, a 10lb bag at a LFS. What you don't use just throw it away or dump it in the woods behind your house. What I did was fill the left over from my 10g, which was probably 40lbs or so, into 5 gal buckets with lids. That way it is kept safe and clean and I can add more sand as needed.

Edit: I have no problems cleaning my tank. Simply wave the vacuum around about 2inches above the sand and all the gunk gets sucked up. The sand will get sucked up but it never makes it to the hose part, it just floats around inside the vacuum part and falls back down.
 
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