Cloudy tank

Hi. I am attempting to start a Deep Sand Bed Salt Water Aquarium. As
recommened on more then one web site I obtained play sand from home
depot and put in my empty aquarium. Then I put in the power heads,
filled the tank with water, added salt, and turned the power heads on.
This has been about 2 week ago and I can not get the the sand to
settle. The tanks IS VERY CLOUDY..more like muddy. I have found if I
turn the powerheads off the tank starts to clear a bit but as soon as I
turm them back on the tank gets cloudy again. The power heads are not
pointing towards the sand. Does anyone know what I am doing wrong, or
how I can clear this up?

Thanks in advance

"Hammer" wrote in message oups.com...
Hi. I am attempting to start a Deep Sand Bed Salt Water Aquarium. As
recommened on more then one web site I obtained play sand from home
depot and put in my empty aquarium. Then I put in the power heads,
filled the tank with water, added salt, and turned the power heads on.
This has been about 2 week ago and I can not get the the sand to
settle. The tanks IS VERY CLOUDY..more like muddy. I have found if I
turn the powerheads off the tank starts to clear a bit but as soon as I
turm them back on the tank gets cloudy again. The power heads are not
pointing towards the sand. Does anyone know what I am doing wrong, or
how I can clear this up?

You need bacteria activity to glue sand particles into bigger chunks.
Time to add live biological material. Start cycling the tank with live rock.

gave up on the play sand. It just looked like mud in the tank after
two weeks. I went to the my LFS and got some fine sand for a base with

live sand on top. By the way the man at the fish store told me play
sand would work IF you had the right sand. He told me that their is
only one brand you can use - Southland - which is only available on the

East coast. Well living in Washington state that isn't much help to me.

Thanks for everyones help. Will try to keep you all posted on how
everything worked out

"Hammer" wrote in message oups.com...
By the way the man at the fish store told me play sand would
work IF you had the right sand. He told me that their is
only one brand you can use - Southland - which is only available
on the East coast. Well living in Washington state that isn't much help to me.

I live in the Chicago area and got the play sand in Home Depot.
It was labeled as tropical coral sand. It was purified/sanitized, dried
and packed into the bag. This is the sand removed from the ocean.
There is nothing special in the "southland" sand making it more
suitable for a reef tank than any other fine grade sand on the market.
Read dr Shimek articles about Deep Sand Beds on www.reefcentral.com

It will look like mud and this is good thing. Until you will add heavy
live biological load to the tank in the form of live rock, fish, corals
you will not have proper bacteria activity and the sand particles
will stay loose. This is bacteria which makes sand particles stick
together and sand in mature reef tank will not be so muddy...

BTW - some people pay very big bucks for actual mud to be put
into their reef tanks... It is called "Miracle Mud" and it is great
for bentic life inhabiting bottom of your reef tank... Look it up on
www.google.com if you do not believe me :-)

You made the right choice, Hammer. Southdown sand is cheap, but even
people that use that aren't always happy. The stuff at the LFS costs
more, but you never hear complaints about it later.

Marc


Hammer wrote:
gave up on the play sand. It just looked like mud in the tank after
two weeks. I went to the my LFS and got some fine sand for a base with

live sand on top. By the way the man at the fish store told me play
sand would work IF you had the right sand. He told me that their is
only one brand you can use - Southland - which is only available on the

East coast. Well living in Washington state that isn't much help to me.

Thanks for everyones help. Will try to keep you all posted on how
everything worked out


--
Personal Page: http://www.sparklingfloorservice.com/oanda/index.html
Business Page: http://www.sparklingfloorservice.com
Marine Hobbyist: http://www.melevsreef.com

FYI: I used silica play sand. Works great...
Been up for 1 year.

"TheRock" wrote in message news:7qRif.567$gi3.546@trndny09...
FYI: I used silica play sand. Works great...
Been up for 1 year.

And you do not have problems with too high silicates ?
No brown algae ? I know people using Hi-Si filters
to get rid of silica from the tap water and your usage
of silica sand must elevate silicates in the water... :-)

I actualy add potasium silicate to my reef tank, to
encorage diatom algae. But no, silica sand does not
disolve well in in the aquarium, and nether does the
silica glass that holds the water in.

Wayne Sallee
Wayne's Pets



Pszemol wrote on 11/29/2005 11:28 AM:
"TheRock" wrote in message
news:7qRif.567$gi3.546@trndny09...

FYI: I used silica play sand. Works great...
Been up for 1 year.


And you do not have problems with too high silicates ?
No brown algae ? I know people using Hi-Si filters
to get rid of silica from the tap water and your usage
of silica sand must elevate silicates in the water... :-)

"Wayne Sallee" wrote in message ...
I actualy add potasium silicate to my reef tank, to
encorage diatom algae. But no, silica sand does not
disolve well in in the aquarium, and nether does the
silica glass that holds the water in.

It does not dissolve well - this is true...
But in chemistry there is not such thing
as unsoluble substances - water is so great
that *some* amount will always dissolve in it.
For some substances it will be much, like NaCl
or sugar. For some others, like CaCO3 it will
be only 400mg/l and then it stops, but still
some amount will find the way to the water.

Compare data for silicon dioxide (quarz)
with data for calcium carbonate CaCO3.
http://www.ilo.org/public/english/pr...8/icsc0808.htm
http://www.ilo.org/public/english/pr...1/icsc1193.htm
They both are listed as "insoluble", but we aquarists
know better than CaCO3 is in fact soluble in water and
we can get concentrations of calcium on the level of
450mg/l from CaCO3 without any big difficulties...

Also - there is silica available in sea water,
so it must come from somewhere - I would be
interested in knowing what is the source of
soluble silica in the sea water. Diatoms are
able to get it somehow for their own usage...

Interesting subject - I wish I knew more about chemistry :-)

"Pszemol" wrote in message
...
"Wayne Sallee" wrote in message
...
I actualy add potasium silicate to my reef tank, to encorage diatom
algae. But no, silica sand does not disolve well in in the aquarium, and
nether does the silica glass that holds the water in.

It does not dissolve well - this is true...
But in chemistry there is not such thing
as unsoluble substances - water is so great
that *some* amount will always dissolve in it.
For some substances it will be much, like NaCl
or sugar. For some others, like CaCO3 it will
be only 400mg/l and then it stops, but still
some amount will find the way to the water.

Compare data for silicon dioxide (quarz)
with data for calcium carbonate CaCO3.
http://www.ilo.org/public/english/pr...8/icsc0808.htm
http://www.ilo.org/public/english/pr...1/icsc1193.htm
They both are listed as "insoluble", but we aquarists
know better than CaCO3 is in fact soluble in water and
we can get concentrations of calcium on the level of
450mg/l from CaCO3 without any big difficulties...

Also - there is silica available in sea water,
so it must come from somewhere - I would be
interested in knowing what is the source of
soluble silica in the sea water. Diatoms are
able to get it somehow for their own usage...

Interesting subject - I wish I knew more about chemistry :-)


This was something that I struggled with for months before setting up my
tank.
I was starting out fresh, so I said screw it...not the best attitude but
I guess I got lucky. I found some healthy debates on the Internet .
Since then I've topped it off lightly (1") with some prettier agra-alive and
Agronite.

I never tested Silica levels. I never saw a reason to. my corals are
healthy, my fish are healthy
and I don't have any Diatom Blooms. I also use RO/DI water, maybe that
helps.

Knock on wood !