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Unread 03/19/2012, 05:55 PM   #1
nellecat
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Question Sand vs crushed coral bottom

Hey guys I'm sure you get this a lot! I'm sorry, but which of these would you prefer and why? I need a bottom for my new 60 gallon. Any help or tips would be good!! (deep sand, sand, crushed coral, or both)?
Thanks


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Unread 03/19/2012, 06:56 PM   #2
thor109
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All I can say is research each one. They all have pluses and minuses. It depends on what you want to keep, how long you plan on having tank and what other filters you plan on using. After everything a major factor is personal preference and look


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Unread 03/19/2012, 07:19 PM   #3
csmfish
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Yup, definitly been over one hundred billion quadrillion times before.


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Unread 03/19/2012, 07:22 PM   #4
SushiGirl
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Sand. Crushed coral holds too much crap and doesn't work if you have any kind of sand sifters.


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Unread 03/19/2012, 07:50 PM   #5
rc1626
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As said it is all specific to what you are looking to do. I've had my tank set up for about 5 years. I started with a fine sand which hasn't stayed still while running a lot of flow through the tank. It got to the point where the front of my tank was bare bottom and the back was where the sand accumulated. This was with my power heads pointing at the surface of the water. It looked horrible to me. For this reason I recently added some CaribSea Aragonite Seaflor Special Grade sand. It is a larger grain and does not move nearly as much as the finer sand I have. So for me it was the obvious flow issues with running an SPS tank that led to me choosing this type. I don't know if it would work if you were looking to house sand sifting gobies (I don't) or any other animals that prefer a finer sand grain or if you don't like the look of a larger grain sand.

Figure out what you want to keep, how much flow your looking to run and what look appeals to you and make your choice from there.

HTH

Rob


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Unread 03/19/2012, 08:31 PM   #6
scarface70706
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3" of some good quality fine grain sand. no need to clean it and no need to mess with it. just let it sit and look pretty. dont bother with crushed coral. all they do is trap junk that can ruin your water quality. deep sand beds are nice and add great filtration but then it slims your livestock options since you dont want any live stock disturbing the sand bed. shallow sand beds are ok too but i like the look of the side of the sand at the bottom of the tank. This is why i went with 3" since its not too deep but its not too shallow therefore i have the best of both worlds. good luck


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Unread 03/19/2012, 08:32 PM   #7
sporto0
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The problem is crushed coral becomes a nightmare over time, like 4 years later it becomes a huge detritus/phosphate trap, where as sand will collect debris but nothing close to the enormity of crushed coral, if you had hardly any live rock on top of it & could keep it vacuumed regularly, then it's not much of an issue, however this is rarely the case, I have a thread on this from early last year, I replaced my CC with a sand bed & have not had any nuisance algae since.


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Unread 03/19/2012, 08:38 PM   #8
belsenj
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Being a newbie to saltwater, but not with freshwater tanks, I was suspect when the store that sold me my set up gave me 3 bags of cc for my tank. It looks beautiful to start, but knowing what I know from freshwater tanks, it is definitely not a good idea. One look and I knew that it traps.

So I decided to put just the one bag in my tank and I will will be removing it and adding a minimal amount of live sand over the next 2 weeks.

I have been reading here at the forum for days as well, so I have been learning.

Thanks for all the great info!

- Susan


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Unread 03/19/2012, 09:14 PM   #9
nellecat
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I want to go with sand. Because I want some LPS that need to be on sand. Also I want some sand sifting fish. I just want to know what type of sand to use and how deep??


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