Florida Keys Sand

So my mom is in Key West a lot for work. I was wondering if I could have her go out to one of the sandbars right before she gets on the plane and bring some sand to me for the tank. i figure it could have a lot of beneficial microorganisms? What do you guys think?

 

Well it isn't really trouble, she's there quite often. My concern was more.....would the sand be viable, is there anything specific to that region that I should be concerned about? I mean, I grew up there but as a kid playing in the sand you don't think about detrimental organisms.

 

you could always wash the sand.

 

+1 IMO its not worth the trouble... I would go to a LFS or a friend and get a bit of sand from their established tank, if a BIO boost is what your looking for... Who know what you would pickup out there!

 

Funny my kids are going to daytona in two weeks. I was going to ask them to fill a five gallon bucket up for me and bring it back. Now I guess I will go buy some lol.

 

You don't want any sand that is taken from near the coast simply because all the pollution gets washed ashore. You'd have to go out a few miles to get "good" sand. Besides - you never know what you may be introducing to your tank that way.

 

I wouldn't mess with that. White fine oolite is the way to go in my opinion. Hard to tell what all is in that sand but you want a calcium based sand like aragonite as opposed to silica (glass) sand.

 

Do you know if it's legal to take sand from the Keys? I know that to collect from the reefs you need a special permit and that might very well apply to sand too?

 

The sand is up for grabs but I do know that to take anything from the reef requires licensing. I figure it owuld be nice however the thought just occurred to me that, being such a tourist area, theres got to be all kinds of fuels, fiberglass etc in the water and sand anywhere near the beach so either I'll call her and tell her to nix the idea or I'll just wash/boil it and put it in as "dead" sand. I'm not really looking for bioload so it's just filler from my "home land," LOL.