A cuppa sand . . . too risky?

[NateHanson]

I'd like to get a little more biodiversity in my sandbed (it's noticably lacking since I had a very low salinity issue a few months back) but I wonder whether it's a safe thing to accept from another tank? With the state of flatworms, redbugs, and monti-eating nudis these days, what's the best way to increase biodiversity in your sandbed, without endangering the corals in your tank?

I dip all frags in lugols and I treat all acros with interceptor. But doing that to livesand would probably kill many of the beneficial critters.

Is it likely that nasties would get transfered in LS? Is there any way to decrease the risk?

 

[~Flighty~]

Don't forget all of the fish parisites that have a developement stage that lives on the sand. Why not QT it for a month?

 

[etszoo]

Greg Hiller usually has some with great biodiversity. I received a couple cups from him
and it was awesome.
Eric

 

[Piscevore]

Well, there is ONE thing I can GUARANTEE you won't get from me


(and on the offhand chance you HAD any to begin with, the latent toxicity of my sand from the sheer volume of FWE I put in my tank, you'd prolly kill yours too)

 

[Liam]

I know they are more expensive but you can now buy cultures of pods,mysids etc but they should be safe.

 

[NateHanson]

I'm not so worried about the pods. I've got lots of those. They didn't seem to suffer from my craptacular new years. It's stuff in the sand itself, like spaghetti worms and stars, that I'm not seeing as much of anymore.

 

[jango]

What kind of fish do you have in the tank?

 

[NateHanson]

No worm or pod eaters really, I don't think. 2 ocellaris clowns, 1 yashi haze goby, 1 majestic angel, and 1 LMB.

Nate

 

[jango]

I think gobies feed off of pods and the rest of the sand bed fauna.

 

[agent6473]

depends on the goby I think. I have an orange spot guttata and a tiger pistol in my 30g and haven't noticed a decrease in sand bed critters. My six line did eat all my mini brittle stars though

 

[NateHanson]

You're right jango that some gobies (particularly the sleeper gobies) live off of fauna in the sand, but the prawn gobies seem to eat food out of the water column more than from the rock or sand. Mine won't even touch food once it hits the sand.

Nate

 

[Chuck Spyropulos]

Nate, you can get all of the stuff you want from indo-pacific sea farms online. www.ipsf.com

 

[skyedolphan]

Nate I can bring you some small serpant stars from my glass at nite and this way you can put them in without the trouble of someone elses sand no problem just shoot me a PM and I will be sure to start collecting them for you

 

[NateHanson]

Thanks Dawn.

 

[Aquadiva]

IMO, anytime you add anything new to your tank you take a risk, regardless of the precautions taken. Many reefers have taken "appropriate" precautions, (dips, etc.) only to still introduce nudis, mites, flatworms, etc. Things are still getting through.

I participated in the "coast to coast sand trade" on RC. Going in, I knew I would have to quarantine the sand for at least a month to see what crawled out. Could be many nastys in there. So far, nothing bad has emerged. It'll stay in the 10 gallon tank for awhile longer.

Adding additional live rock to your tank could be just as precarious as adding live sand.

Unless you just want to add only "large sandbed critters," ie bristleworms, stars, spaghetti worms, you are going to have to go on some amount of faith.

-Linda