sand question

[duke62]

ive had like 30 lbs of sand sitting in my old setup for 2 months now and i recently purchased a 50 gal tank setup.is there anyway i can reuse the sand from that setup or just buy some new.its still moist.i heard something about freshwater wash but im adding some livestock to the tank as soon as i get it running and i dont want any die off from that sand.thanks

 

[marki24]

rinse it with RODI water and then it will need to go thru the cycle all over again.

 

[duke62]

what will have a worse cycle the sand i have or new sand

 

[Breakin Newz]

New live sand from MY experiance has not caused a cycle for me... I have done about 5 tank transfers myself and always used NEW live sand without and kind of bad affects.... Corals and fish were good...

 

[marki24]

IMO both will go thru a cycle. Just that the Live sand will go thru it quicker.

 

[NYreefNoob]

i switched sand over from old tank to new tank, but i ran a filter in the water for a few hours, put sand and about 8" of water and put filter in, next morning i added all my live stock and corals with no loss

 

[duke62]

what i was thinking of doing is put the sand in a bucket and mix it around and empty bucket.ill do that a couple of times in hot maybe even boiling water

 

[MikeyZO]

but boiling water might cause a worse dieoff and actually create a cycle...

 

[duke62]

everything should be dead in the sand anyway.it has been sitting for 2 months with no light no filtration no heat.

 

[CHEMCHEF]

I would think that if the bacteria can live in a bag of moist sand, it can live in the environment it has been living in. I would just rinse it with ro. or just wait til u do a water change, and use the waste water to rinse it.
JMO
But I use NSW also, so sterile is not my thing:shhh: