Disaster When Changing To Sand!

[DD2510]

I decided to change from gravel to sand, picked up a 25kg bag of play sand from B&Q, spent a couple of hours cleaning it and managed to get the water to run clear. Bought a little tank from the lfs with a filter to house the fish whilst i cleaned the gravel out of the tank.. I then added the new sand and put the decor back in, I placed a mixing bowl into the tank and poured the water direct into that so it wouldnt disturb the sand. All seemed to be going to plan.. I left the tank/sand to settle for 1hr then switched the filter on.. When i returned from my friends (about 4hrs from switching the filter on)is when i discovered the disaster
The water was very dirty, it was like someone had dropped soil into the tank.. i then did a 90% water change and still the same thing happened. Not wanting to put the fish through anymore stress of being in a smaller tank (it was now 3am) i removed all the sand and cleaned the tank again and went back to gravel, Finally at 3.50am my tank was back to normal and the fish are happy once again..

This is the sand i used: http/www.diy.com/diy/jsp/bq/nav.jsp?action=detail&fh_secondid=9411956&fh_view_size=10&fh_location=//catalog01/en_GB&fh_search=play+sand&fh_eds=%C3%9F&fh_refview=search&ts=1272213635849&isSearch=true

Sorry to ramble on, but to put my mind at rest does it seem like i did anything incorrect when changing over? Is it possible the sand was from a bad batch? Im totally confused as to what went wrong... I would still love to change over to sand but im afraid i might get the same results again.

Cheers

 

[ellena]

It could have been mulm stuff from your filter? If the water was running clear when you washed the sand, no reason why it should start muddying up your water once it was in the tank. Having said that, whatever it was, you'd think 4 hrs would be enough time for it to settle.

 

[DD2510]

i put 3 polishing pads into the filter so that it would catch most of the rubbish.. I was shocked when i returned home The sand seemed fine when it was being cleaned and put into the tank, but i did notice when i removed the sand from the tank it had large pieces of black stuff in it(reminded me of when you burn paper and it flakes off), I never noticed this when i cleaned it.

 

[Nick16]

yeah, i use argos play sand. tried and tested. i didnt even wash it and no probs. although wouldnt recommend doing that.

 

[DD2510]

its gotta be something ive done, some sort of school boy error along the way.

 

[Enna]

I've recently changed from sand to gravel, although I used the B&Q kiln dried natural sand I've read lots of people on here have used the B&Q play sand with no problem. I can't understand what went wrong for you, my water was a little cloudy for a good couple of hours after but not so bad to harm fish. Does the sand you took out look or wash dirty now? Was there lots of dirty water in the tank after the gravel was taken out but before the sand was put back in? Hope you can work it out.

BTW Ellena what's mulm?

 

[DD2510]

no water was left in the tank, it was drained fully before putting the sand into the tank. The sand that was removed washes with a slight murky colour to it now.


Mulm is the undecomposed fish wastes and other solid matter that accumulates in the aquarium as a fine, brownish, fluffy material requiring periodic removal by siphoning.

 

[mattlee]

did you totally clean the floor of the tank when the gravel was removed as there would have been muck/poo etc under the gravel?

i used argos play sand and it did have bits of muck in the sand even after cleaning but it all settled on the top and syphoned up easily

 

[DD2510]

yeah the tank was lifted out to the yard and hosed down and cleaned...

 

[Mr Spoon]

Very strange, maybe try again but use argos play sand.

I just noticed in your sig that you are running a 1500 power head, if you have just upgraded it can blow all the muck out your filter and around your tank, if not then i dont know.

 

[jbeechey]

You will get a lot of sand suspended in the water after changing no matter how long you wash the sand for, can take up to a day to fully clear.