Please help - have I really screwed up????

[seado]

We have a 37 gallon been up and going well since November 2000. It had 1 bag of sugar sized oolitic and quite a bit of live sand on top. Over the course of months it seems that the top had gotten more and more coarse, lots of shellpieces, etc. I've been finding that the nitrates have stayed around 25. Thought maybe the substrate was the problem. Dr. Ron had recommended I remove that off the top when I asked him. I started scooping it out today and the more I scooped the more crushed shell I found, it seems there is little to no sand. There is not a lot of space to scoop around the rock. So I had to give it up for the day. Still alot left. Has anyone tried to siphon off stuff like that? Have I just released a whole
!#*! load of bad stuff into my tank? I've been fretting about the fish and corals. The tank is at my husband's office. We will go back in the AM, I just hope we don't find everything dead! What should I do now? Has anyone used a new shop vac to get substrate out? What should I have done so maybe I will learn from my mistake besides starting out with more fine grain sand. I had crushed coral first based on advise of LFS, then read about LS so took every thing out and started over as advised by another LFS. The LS they sold me was very coarse and I purchased quite a bit. Now since reading these boards, I felt like I should have a finer grain sandbed. I have fish and corals at this point and really can't "start over" again. I'm assuming I can't add the SD on top of this coarse stuff right?

I recently set up a 120 gallon at home with 200# of southdown and 150# LR. I am in the process of adding more SD (40-50#) as it didn't seem deep enough. I have also gotten detrivore kits and live sand/mud (about 15 #) from several sources. Most of the live sand is also coarse, especially some Figi LS, other is mud-like with chips of shell and such. Will I end up in the same situation down the road? Please advise as I can't be starting over and over again. Sorry this is long, I'm worried and frustrated!! Please help!!

[Colin]

Hi,

I think it'll be fine. Just slowly add some finer stuff on top (like maybe .25 inches every several days). After several months, if the coarse stuff works its way to the top, sift it with a net to get the big stuff.

The live sand I recently bought was almost all shell hash and coarse stuff. However, I kinda like the look. And my pistol shrimp loves the stuff. [img]/ubb/biggrin.gif[/img]

--Colin

[scubadude]

Hi seado [img]/ubb/smile.gif[/img]
Welcome to Reefland!

Here is what I would do....first I would try to get some of that Nitrate level down, maybe a couple of w/c's with a day or two between them...change about 40% of your water each time....then I would SLOWLY (as advised by Colin) start putting the BIG gravel or Crushed coral and put it in a strainer like panty hose and keep it in the tank....work in one corner and when you get that corner fairly cleaned then I would put some Home Depot aka Southdown sand there and put your pantyhose filled crushed coral ontop of the 4"+ sandbed and let the beneficial bacteria migrate down into the new section of the SB this can be a long process but can be done if you are patient and you will see a longterm success with you tank. HTH [img]/ubb/biggrin.gif[/img]

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