Old Castle Sand (aka Southdown) Reef Only?

[reef150]

Hi, Im starting to get the impression that Old Castle sand (aka southdown) - play sand from the carribean is best used for Reefs only.

I read a couple post from other message boards and some people were mentioning that the fishes would dig the sand and it'll cloud the aquarium. Therefore, its best to use it in a reef only and not with fishes digging in them.

can anyone second this?

[hesstondc]

I have heard of that problem. If you have fish that dig, ie gobies and blennies I would do use it. This stuff is very fine in partical size. But if you have tangs, clowns, damsles etc you will not have problems...

Hope that helps

[icebear]

i had crushed coral and puka shell mixed substrate and my maroon clown dug in it anyway. i have southdown in my nano and the perch dug in it all the time, but it never clouded up. from my limited experience, if you have digging fish they will dig no matter what you have for substrate. but like i mentioned, the nano water is nice and clear despite the digging that went on.

[Kevin1000]

Any fine sand will develop some cohesion (sp?) and settle down after a while - I would not be concerned.