I wanted live sand, but the guy I bought off of gave me crushed coral. I do want a jawfish, and I heard they like crushed coral for their den. What are the pros and cons compared to live sand?
Cons the particles are big and trap detrius. Burrowing snails cant burrow through the crushed coral to keep the substrate clean. Can cause nitrates to be high
con - I also believe it doesn't keep your pH as stable as live sand. Not only will it be harder for burrowing snails to stir around, but it'll be harder for hermits to clean as well.
Pro - it was free and it won't blow around in your tank like live sand will, I've got about 5lbs in my sump because live sand is so light and fine.
To change it I would do it in sections. First do a PWC and siphon out the CC about maybe a quarter section. Then clean and rinse your sand and slide it down a pvc pipe to where it`s needed. This will help to cut down on the sand storm.
If you don't already have animals, just take all the crushed coral out at once. Your water will be cloudy for a few days, but you'll be really glad you made the switch later on.
Cons to crushed coral? Gets dirty, burrowing animals don't like it, it's hard to clean, it will harm your water quality.
Yeah this has been a pain in my ass. I got the cc from a guy on craigslist, he said it was live sand and when I got there he gave me cc. It was too far of a drive to come home empty handed.
Plus I bought a metal halide light from him and when I plugged it in it shot sparks everywhere. The light wasn't his fault, but I am still out 150 dollars.
heres another vid there are a lot of ways to do it and a lot of different recipes from just sand cc and cement to cc salt and cement I even saw one using elbow pasta.[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iRBNpmjMcTI&feature=channel[/ame]
Egg crate on the bottom is optional. It helps to raise the rock up off the glass bottom instead of having an inch or two of your rock covered up by sand.