I have a question for all you experienced in this hobby. I have a 150 gal reef tank with a sump thats been running for a year now. Everything has been going great. I want to add a 2' x 2' x 2' cube to the system to hold a clam for a while. I have heard that by adding live sand to a existing tank it will have to cycle again???? What would be the safest way to introduce the new tank with my system. Im going to use the same sump with another pump for that tank. No other fish are going to be added. Any help will be great. Thanks Marc
Adding sand to mature system
- Thread starter nenzi71
- Start date
ColaAddict
New member
You don't want to stir up old sand. The reason is that sand holds on to detritus, and overtime, it collects alot of bad stuff, that when stirred up can be toxic to the whole system. There should be no problem adding new sand though. I would put it in a small bucket after washing it and slowly submerge the bucket into your tank, that way it will keep sand from clouding up your tank to a minimum, then just slowly pour it over your existing sandbed.
BADGUS
Active member
It appears that the entire new addition will have the new sand only?If so make sure the sand is rinsed thiri and you should have no issues at all.I have plumbed small tanks together and usually opt for dry rock and drysand and just seed the new addition with Rick/sand from stable system.Good luck.