Is it possible to keep sand white?

Chrisk-K

Chrisk-K

Theodore P. Charles Fellow of AC
Dec 1, 2009
897
0
0
Maryland
I love the look of white sand substrate but wonder if it's possible to keep it white.

I set up a freshwater 40g tank with sand 3 months ago. Now that brown diatom patches are gone, the color of the sand has a yellow and light brown tint. Is it because of diatoms? I'm amazed by some tanks on Youtube that have perfectly white sand substrate. I siphon once a week when I do a 50% water change and water parameters are perfect (0, 0, 10, ph=7.2). Will my substrate ever become white again?
 
A friend of mine uses a turkey baster to "turn" the sand and bring the whiter stuff to the surface.
 
I can easily turn the sand to bring whiter sand to the surface.

My question is, "Is the discolorization due to diatoms? Or is it something evitable because there's organic stuff in the aquarium?"
 
The only pure white gravel I know is crushed marble, brown algae grows on it eventually, I found cleaning the gravel helped, but it just becomes brown again.
 
Mine stays white, it's playsand from lowes.

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Some people have perfect, sparkling clean, Amanoesque tanks...and some people have "cruddy" tanks with algae and biofilm galore. Provided the water quality is excellent, the fish like it both ways. So why fret?

Generally, I find that the more time and money you spend on the tank, the cleaner and sharper looking it will be. So if you want that rigidly clean look, you need to be prepared to pay up (not always, but generally) with top of the line equipment and spend time on it. Not time cleaning and scrubbing necessarily, but monitoring and watching the tank to make sure everything is balanced.

FISHSHROD's tank is beautiful and perfect the way most of us strive for our tanks to be. It's a lot like the sort of tanks Tom Barr has. I bet he doesn't spend a lot of time scrubbing or cleaning but I bet what he does do, is test and monitor the ferts and CO2.

I know I'm too lazy (not to mention cheap) to do that, so I live with the tanks looking kind of grungy, the way most of us do ;)
 
Or you could go with black sand instead. Likewise give a crisp, sharp "professional" look, a good background for everything, is said to bring out brighter colors in many creatures particularly inverts. And as those of us of A Certain Age (and shall we say "gravitationally challenged") have long known, black covers a multitude of flaws, appearance-wise. :)
 
I do dose the EI method and clean the glass once a week. I do run 2 FLUVAL FX5'S and clean them about every 2 weeks and make sure the co2 is right. I also move the sand around once a week.
Thanks for the compliment Platy.
 
There you go, Chris - that's how to keep your sand white. See, I told you it was a lot of work...;) But seriously, all you really need to do is turn it over - you can make a "sand rake" yourself: http://www.aquarium forum.com/f18/do-yourself-sand-rake-smooth-your-30.html#post83

Or buy the super expensive (I would guess around $40) tool that Aqua Design Amano (ADA) probably sells...I have no idea, it could be more but it's probably not less.

And FISHSHROD, you deserved the compliment...anyone who works as hard as you do on your aquariums is definitely deserving of praise. It is a stunning tank, definitely high end, Los Angeles plastic surgeon's office worthy :D

P.S. You'll have to delete the space between aquarium and forum to make the link work, for some reason those two words turn into asterisks when I type them and it makes the link not work...
 
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