Coralline on the sand?

Basically the title says it all. Can coralline grow on sand? I have the purple and dark red coralline growing in my tank and areas of my sand bed are turning red. It's not red slime or something like that. It's almost like each individual grain of sand is turning a dark red. Turning or moving the sand doesn't disturb it at all, it's just each grain is turning red. Any ideas?

 

depends on the size of the sand, on larger grains yes, on smaller sugar sized sand no.

 

Yes, it depends on the sand. In my 37 my grains are larger, and they have coralline on them.

 

Ugh, that's annoying, I like the look of a white sand bed as opposed to a red one.

 

I know - I don't like it either. You can try scraping it off : ;D

 

you gotta get the small sand it prevents diatom algae too. I learned that after my first tank.

 

So what if I get a back of the smaller stuff and slowly add it in? Could I just cover my existing sand bed or should I "phase" it out?

 

I'm going to say yes...but I don't really know. I don't know why you couldn't just put it on top...

 

assuming you have a shallow sand bed I would just replace it and expect a small cycle.

assuming you have a dsb i would just siphon a little bit out each day until its gone then add the new sand.