Rinsing Oolitic Aragonite Sand

[Tyslin]

Quick Question,

Should I rinse my Aragonite Sand, just purchase it? or just put it in my tank. Also what benefits are there to rinse the sand? Thanks.

[philip_r5]

Is it brand new in bag or live sand in bag? Did you get it from some location (collected personally)? Most people will prob tell you its fine if in a bag or bought live from a good rep person. Then when it comes to collecting it yourself then it verys. I have had success with collecting the sand, I cooked the sand in an oven at 450degrees for about 20mins or so a pan which was an 8x8, checked its temp which was around 280degrees. Then I took and through it into a cold bucket of water and rinsed it. When I have used bag I just took and dumped into tank (plug and play ).

[Tyslin]

Brand new bag just bought from a reputable store. Not live Sand. It's fine oolitic sand.

[Diver_1298]

Rinse, rinse, rinse and then rinse again.
The purpose is to keep from having a major cloud storm in your tank. There are other ways to try and avoid this but rinsing is one of the best.

Jim

[geekdafied]

+1 on the Rinse, rinse, rinse and then rinse again

[Tangster]

If its not to late ? then never rinse new aragonite sand all that small micron dust is what will add plenty of magnesium and strontium and Ca. and Carbonates to your tank. This is why many have a hard time to get any coralline growth. And then they turn around and buy the dust back in a bottle of water called purple up and aragomilk and the powder you just rinse is called agromite LOL. I have never rinsed it my self.. Also the same stuff in larger chunks is used in Calcium reactors .. Its your choice but to rinse it is to deprive your new tank of many needed elements.

[sssnake]

I'm with the Tangmeister on this one!!

As some members in here may (or may not) know I just started my new set-up yesterday. I laid down a couple of bags of sand (oolitic aragonite by Seachem) before pouring my water into the tank and I did not rinse the sand this time around.

This morning, after only 18 hours, the cloudiness is almost completely gone, considering the fact that I have a power head going right from the get-go. The very fine dust particles will eventually settle to the bottom. Can't defy the law of gravity no matter how hard we try.

So no, I would not rinse this type of sand. JMHO

[Tyslin]

Thanks everyone for your input really appreciate it. Other question about sand and how deep. I will Probably will get a lot of replies on this one. This is what I understand about DSB and how it is helpful, please correct me if I am wrong I really don't mind.

Nitrogen(building block of life) is introduced into seawater as nitrogen gas, certain bacteria and blue green algae convert nitrogen into nutrients for plants. Through photosymthesis plants incorporate nitrogen into the proteins of there tissues. These proteins eventually reenters the environment as ammonia, through 2 ways, I'll only talk about one. The first method is by Animals eating the plants and is excreted back into the environment as urea, uric acid or ammonia. Bacterial activity quickly changes the urea and uric acid in ammonia.

Nitrifying bacteria quickly oxidize ammonia into first nitrite then nitrate. Nitrate can be used by plant life as a nutrient or can be reduced to dinitrogen gas (N2) through denitrifying bacteria. So the upper layer of the DSB has nitrifying bacteria which converts the ammonia, detritus and left over food into nitrite,.. the denitrifying layer of the DSB has bacteria that converts the nitrite into nitrate which is released as dissolved nitrogen gas into the water column and into the air again. Hence the use of DSB's. Before I ask my question can someone or everyone go over my understanding of this process that is part of a DSB. I want to make sure that I understand this theory. Thanks.

[Tangster]

Yes thats it in theory but not so much in principle ..Its like I told the Great Dr once you have damn little box of water not a ocean and anyone who thinks they can separate and isolate a single part of the total ocean ecology and then set and think you have a complete system then you have at it.
Because in a few yrs about 2 on average and thats with out a lot of tweaking and cleaning it weekly and then replenishing all the magic sand fauna/bugs every 6 months or so then have at it . And its all in the name of a natural way they think to lower nitrates. Nope not me there are far more efficient and safer way to complete the nitrogen cycle rather then a DSB. And also the other ways that deal with the No3's do not impose such a limiting factor on how many animals you can keep unlike with a DSB..And are far less worrisome and labor intense.. (:

Good luck with But I'd rather just use a inch or so of dottom cover.. That DSB snake bites them all but they never tell you that in their books.