Please help me decide what color sand to use in my 120 upgrade. I think black sand is cool and gives a sharp contrast to brightly colored fish, but I'm worried that it would limit my fish choices and might become boring after awhile, and nothing beats a clean bright substrate. What do you think?
What's cool about your sand substrate color?
- Thread starter NL146
- Start date
Killerdrgn
Advanced Reefer
- Location
- Park Ridge, NJ
I have black sand, and if you don't keep it clean, it can become a dusty brown very quickly.
Interesting. Do you think it gets dirty or shows more quickly than lighter colored substrates?
- Location
- Queens, New York
Do not use black sand. I thought the same exact way. After a while the black sand looks so nasty, and honestly it doesn't even look black under lighting. It actually turns into a brownish color.
IMO just stick with nice white bright sand.
It also just looks so much more natural.. the black makes it look fake.
IMO just stick with nice white bright sand.
It also just looks so much more natural.. the black makes it look fake.
- Location
- poughquag, ny
fiji pink, it's more white then anything and on my thought the light the sand might get more reflection back to make tank look brighter
ryangrieder
Advanced Reefer
- Location
- Northern Jersey
personally i have black sand and i dont think it looks fake or nasty after awhile. black background, black sand, black canopy and black stand. looks amazing. i used hawaiian black my caribsea and mixed the natural ocean black by caribsea. i love it. but i also do have my other tank with fugi pink and like that as well.
- Location
- Long Island
I have plain white sand and I like it. It gets dirty quickly though so it requires siphoning.
- Location
- Queens, New York
I used just the Caribsea.. and under my lighting in my aquapod.. it just turned into this ugly brown. If it stayed pure black, that'd be cool. And it turned into that ugly brown as long as the lights were on. As soon as they turned off it was back to a black appearance.
Do you have to clean often?
- Location
- poughquag, ny
never cleaned my sand, i have a ton of flow and cuc
Why is it either black or white? I admit I have white but I think the coarse shell substrate looks cool. ESP when something tunnels with it. Thinking of turning creating a section of my substrate like that.
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Sent from my iPhone using Reefs
- Location
- Long Island
I have coarse shell substrate as well. I mixed it with my fine white sand. I like the shell substrate but I think I have opted for the sugar sand again. I think my clean up crew is terrible though, so I am going to start siphoning.
- Location
- Briarcliff, Westchester
I used ocean direct live sand and it was so worth it, no rinsing needed and it is so natural looking with everything from oolite to crushed coral.
ryangrieder
Advanced Reefer
- Location
- Northern Jersey
well thats understandable because if you look on caribsea's website it actually gives off a few specs of brown to it. my tank does not consist of just that though. i got 10 pounds of CaribSea arag-alive hawaiian. black and 20 pounds of CaribSea super naturals Tahitian moon . the tahitian moon sand is very fine... not as fine though as CaribSea arag-alive fiji pink. fiji pink is very nice because it is very white, but i feel the ocean direct Oolite is a tad bit brighter. unless you mean the CaribSea aragonite fiji pink reef sand because i have no personal experiance with that type.
i almost wish i did all Tahitian moon and no hawaiian black. i dislike the larger stones in the package. those are the ones that give off more of a brownish tint. but to answer you NL147 no i do not need to clean it that much. even when i just recently threw more rock in my tank and moved the sand around it barely got cloudy. personally i like it. others may disagree but i enjoy the black sand.
even though these are really crappy pictures it will kinda give you an idea of my tank with black sand. i do have alot of live rock so i really only have one patch of sand showing. i will take better pics with my HTC incredible and show you when i get a chance...
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ryangrieder
Advanced Reefer
- Location
- Northern Jersey
tahitian moon claims to be "live sand" but its dry based sand. and cheap as well...
- Location
- Rockland County NY
I got my sand from www.marcorocks.com. 40lb for $29.00, which includes shipping. It is a great deal. It's dry sand, and the sugarry texture. I used 40lb for my 40 breeder. I have another 40lb, minus a few cupfulls. I have to see how much more I will need after I get water in my tank.
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