Making Live sand .....

[ddcengineering]

Hi, yes i am new to 3reef and sw reef keeping in general. I am doing my research and figuring what the best bang for the buck is and how i can go about being successful. Over my 3weeks of research i have been unable to find anything on using sand from a beach... (yes i know it has virus' and what not) but what if you were to kill it by soaking it in vingar and hydrogen peroxide. and throughly drying it. i want to do this becasue i want to use black sand in my tank and i dont know where i can find live or dead sand of that color. except from a beach... (hehe maui... goign there for vacation)..

i also had another question about the differences between the sps and the other coral type. waht does sps stand for and what wattage per gallon do they require?

i was lookign into getting the RSM, but i saw the new JBJ 28g HQI comming out soon and i was wondering which would be best for a stock reef/fish aquarium. as for lighting/size/waterflow, dont care on price but what would be better for teh coral..
RSM- larger, 3w/g, 2 exit water valvs but in the same location
JBJ- smaller, 5.3w/g 2 exit water valves in different location.

[KOgle]

The bad thing about using sand from the beach is you never know what's been in that sand. I suppose you could kill everything on it but you would not be able to get rid of the chemicals that have been deposited into the sand. If you're really set on doing this I would suggest renting some scuba or snorkling gear and going out as far from shore as you can to get your sand. I've got to assume that the shore of Hawii are steep and snorkling might be out of the question...

As far as the equipment questions go I don't know anything about them. Sorry...

[ddcengineering]

Thanks for your input!!
ok, so i wouldnt have to worry about the viruses and bad bacteria. do you happen to know if there is a place to buy black sand/ls?

[ddcengineering]

If anyone else has any ideas/comments i would like to hear what you have to say

[coral reefer]

Do you plan on keeping corals?
Two things that I don't like about black sand in a reef tank are: it contains no buffering capabilities like aragonite sand!
And the second thing is that if you plan on keeping corals, the light will get absorbed in the sand instead of bouncing off the sand to hit the underside of your corals. I hope I explained it well enough for you to understand!

[ziggy222]

i two prefer aragonite.i just wanted to point out that you don't actually need live sand.it just gives you i just start.you can add live rock and wait for the sand to grow its own bacteria.since you have'nt put your sand in yet,look into plenums.you may want to put in a plenum before putting your sand in.

[ddcengineering]

ok awsome, you guys are really helpful.