Live Sand help for new tank????

[stagger19]

Hi Im setting up a 20 Gallon mini Salt, and was wondering for the sand should I go 100% live sand or get some argonite sand and seed it with live sand?

I would imagine all sand will be live after the bacteria establishes and grows in the sand, but to start up the tank I wasnt sure what ratio of live vs dry sand I should use?

Also is the sand in the bag with water that claims to cycle your tank any good, or should I get live sand from my LFS tanks?

Thanks in advance.....

 

[KahluaZzZ]

Dunno about the ratio, i guess the more LS you put the fastest it will cycle...but if you wanna save some cash you could do a 20 % LS / 80 % dry.
Since i added some flamingo pink reef sand ( dry ), spagetti worms + hair worms appeared..friendly guys cleaning. Might be a coincidence, but i believe some eggs/stuff can survive.
Anyways my crushed coral / rubble / sand were all dry stuff. LR did the job and seeded.
Better wait for other answers by people who bough LS. In any cases, the sand will become alive one day

 

[JestersCourt05]

I have a 55 I'm working on and I put in 45lbs of Aragonite, and 20lbs of Live Sand just to keep my cost down. It'll all populate into live sand anyhow, so if you have to keep costs down, then you can mix it. If cost isn't a factor for you, you'll be much better off going with all live sand, and that'll cut your cycle time down greatly - ( especially if you have some live rock in there ). Also, the live sand that I got had water in the bag too. What brand of live sand is your LFS getting you??? I used CaribSea in my tank, and it was great.

 

[stagger19]

I have a bag of carib sea aragonite sand, and I was gonna buy the wet sand in a bag to seed the dry mix.

 

[JestersCourt05]

I have a bag of carib sea aragonite sand, and I was gonna buy the wet sand in a bag to seed the dry mix.

That'll work just fine. If you don't use any live sand at all, it'll make your cycle longer. The more live sand you have, the shorter your cycle. It's honestly that easy. There's no real ratio or anything when it comes down to it. If you have the money, get the live sand. If you don't, just be patience with your cycle.

 

[stagger19]

Ok thanks, simple enough, and makes sense!

 

[1979camaro]

live sand is fine but the real key to cycling is in the live rock. the amount of beneficial bacteria in live rock far surpasses that in the LS. furthermore, i do not believe there is any reason to add a significant amount of LS...my reccomendation would be to get a local reefer or LFS to give you a cup of their substrate and use that as your seed; just use a bunch of dry other than that one cup. the bagged stuff like aragalive is a big time waste of $$ in my opinion

 

[stagger19]

Ok, thanks. Yeah Im gonna do like 20 LBS of live rock for the 20 gallon.
I kind of figure the wet aragolife was a waste, just like the product cycle,
how can bacteria survive the shelve life that long.

When I get my life rock this weekend, I will get a few pounds of live sand to seed my aragonite sand.

I think this weekend I will have the 20 up and running and start the cycle process. I purchased my marine test kit today, instant ocean salt mix, portable refractometer, plus dial type salinity meter. Already have the power head(s), and heater (100W)

Have every thing I need except the live rock, and some live sand.

I may go with a protein filter down the road, but well see how it goes with the water change schedule and my nitrates.

thanks for all your help

 

[wayne]

You can do better with the regular water changes than with a cheapo skimmer.