Keep the sand?

[thedasher]

Right now I have a 60 gallon tank and was planning to upgrade to around a 100 gallon. I was wondering if I have to put the old sand that's in the 60g in the new tank or can I put new sand.

[ca1ore]

You certainly CAN put in new sand - in fact, that is what most people would recommend. Depending upon the condition of your existing sand, I always think it's a shame to throw out a mature sand-bed, with all its attendant worms and other critters, so I generally reuse most of it.

[madadi]

I reuse it also but I do stir it up well and get out as much detritus as I can. a lot of bacteria and fauna will survive to repopulate the new sand quicker and maybe even reduce cycle time depending on your set up. Of course rinse it in your old tank water don't use fresh water.

[thedasher]

Yah I would reuse it but I want to change the color to black. I might mix both colors how do you think it will look

[power boat jim]

Not a big fan of salt and pepper look for a reef, but its your tank. It wont have any effect on the over all health of the system. I too would reuse the sand you have now and just add to it.

[andrewkw]

Washing out new sand is a pain.

Washing out old sand is a pain and it smells.

Given you already have the sand I say put up with the smell. You may want to keep the top inch or so to seed the new sandbed, but the rest I'd just wash like it was new sand and deal with the smell.

[asylumdown]

Are there any problems in your 60 gallon that you don't want in your new tank (aiptasia, problem algae, etc.)?

If there are, reusing your old sand will almost certainly transmit them to your new tank.

I also personally would rather just start over with new stuff. You'll never get all the crud that's built up in a sand-bed out through rinsing it. It may never be a problem for you, but it's one more potential source of one.

The argument for keeping it is that there might be things in there you don't want to lose, but unless you personally went to the ocean and collected a bunch of sand from the bottom of a healthy reef then flew it home in a heated, oxygenated vessel, there is nothing in your current sand bed that won't be rapidly repopulated just through the normal activities of setting up a tank.

All those worms and pods that do so well in our tanks are the beneficial equivalent of aiptasia - they're organisms that through an accident of evolution developed a set of traits that enabled them to do inordinately well in aquariums. They can survive trips across the world on damp rocks, reproduce in a way that is compatible with protein skimmers and filter socks, are either not eaten by the fish we commonly keep or reproduce fast enough for it to not matter, and can handle swings in temperature and parameters that would kill the things you actually paid for. There are 10,000 species of polychaete worm, and yet you'll only find the same 5 or 6 in every marine aquarium on the planet. I bet if you were to do a detailed survey of the micro-fauna of 1000 mature tanks on 5 different continents, you'd find a very consistent community of animals, and you'd find it whether the tank owner ever did anything to encourage it or not.

[Susan987]

I would start with new sand, just make sure all snails and other life you want in your new tank get picked up when you make the move