Adding Sand

Who has the best/cleanest/easiest way to add sand to a tank that is up and running already?

I need to add a couple of inches to my sand bed and want to do it without making a huge mess.

Any good ideas?

 

Turn off all pumps. Cut a hole in the corner of the bag. Put your hand over the hole and slowly lower the bag to the bottom of the tank and slowly release it.

Before doing this, make sure you've removed some water. The sand will use some of your water volume.

 

You mean kinda like a pastry bag thing? Cut a hole in the corner of a zip lock, then pour it out at the bottom?

Interesting....have you done it, does it work? How much "dust" does it make?

 

I just use the bag the sand came in. If I'm adding a small amount of sand, I'll just spend the extra $5 and get Aragalive. It's wet so there's little to no dust. To add to larger systems, I'll use dry sand because it's cheaper in large quantities. Then I'll use less flow for several days to give the bacteria a chance to spread and hold the sand grains down. If you're adding 2", you're going to want to do 1/3 of your tank at a time allowing bacteria a chance to populate the new layer before adding your next 1/3 of sand.