Good source for live sand in Canada?

[Metaphase]

Most US stores won't ship to Canada, like IPSF. I can't get it from my LFS. Places like J&L don't carry it. Though I may try to get some from local reefers, please don't suggest that option to me. I'm rather screwed if I can't find a source...

[pluff]

Hi where in Canada are u?

[Metaphase]

I'm in Waterloo, Ontario. Twin city with Kitchener! Sorry I should have been more specific...

[pluff]

Hi dosn't Big Als in Ontario sell Live Sand? I figured they would have everything a person needs as there so big of a Company?If not try this site http://www.aquariumpros.ca/ I'm sure they can help u out :)....Good Luck !!

[Metaphase]

There's one locally, but it's rather small. The only way I could get anything "live" would be to take some of their arangonite subtrate (really big particles), but I don't want to do that because their tank in not well established, they didn't use any live sand, only critters from live rock...

[Metaphase]

I don't know if Aquarium Pro's has it because I don't have excel to view their "livestock" list, and the link to the viewer is NOT the viewer it is some win2k active directory sizer garbage. Plus, I don't know if it would even on another website be listed under livestock. Very poor sight design IMO.

[fishguy01]

I don't know how good those 'bottled' live sand are, but I think Big Al carries them...cost a bundle though

[MayerKT]

Meta-

I looked for you and didn't see a listing for live sand (i figured it'd be next to the live rock, but it wasn't), but maybe you could call them and see what they could do for you......

Sorry, i have no other suggestions!

Good luck!

[Metaphase]

Thanks MayerKT, I appreciate it. I will phone if need be. I've never heard about bottled live sand, I will look into it. The Canadian Big Al's has a smaller range of products.

[delphinus]

Have you tried saltwaterconnection.com (http://www.saltwaterconnection.com) ? I have some live sand in my tank from there ... :D ...

[Metaphase]

Looks good. How big is your tank and how much live sand did you use compared to regular sand?

[Metaphase]

It seems that the stuff from IPSF would be better though. All the little amphipods, wondermud, detrivores etc. The brittle worms look great. I'm not sure if this is correct but it would seem that different sorts of critters would inhabit the reef rock as opposed to the sand surrounding the reef...therefore making the LR culture not as good.

BTW I've heard about the IPSF issue with flatworms, not like it matters to me...

[delphinus]

The reef I am currently building up is a 75g with a 48x18 footprint. The livesand/dry sand mix is about 50/50 sand in there. It's kind of a long boring story but here it is anyways. Both the dry sand and the live sand came from saltwaterconnection.com. It actually wasn't me who bought the live sand, it came into my possession from a fellow hobbyist who was taking down one of her tanks, but I know she got the live sand from there since I had the opportunity to buy some at the same time to save on shipping costs but had to opt out due to no funds at the time. (Whew! Run-on sentence alert ... my English teacher would be so proud.) Anyways it's pretty nice sand although it came from a trigger tank so it was pretty much depleted of a lot of things by the time it came into my care, but it is slowly replenishing.

In the past, on my other two tanks, I've gone mostly dry sand and seeded it with a pound or two of live sand from time to time. Stuff also comes off live rock and works it way into the sand, so even sterile sand becomes more or less "activated" or "live" over time anyways. Either method of "1 scoop live sand per lots of dry sand" vs "lots of live sand" have worked pretty well for me so far. So my "recommendation" is go with whatever works for you! My guess is probably the more live sand you can put in at any one time, the shorter any resulting cycle would be, so go with more live sand if you can. But even if you can't afford a whole lot, a little is better than none, so it's hard to go wrong IMO.

cheers

[Metaphase]

Thanks for the story. ;) Saltwater Connection looks good. I emailed them about the shipping charges... They might be alot. I'm gonna shoot for about 10% live sand, I don't think I could afford any more.

[Metaphase]

They said that it would be about $65 dollars to ship for 60 lbs. That was just a random figure, I don't if I really want 60 lbs...

[pluff]

Metaphase,I checked Aquarium Pro's for you,they don't have live sand listed,:sad1: but they have Live Rock.Good Luck

[Metaphase]

Pluff, not to trouble you, but do you know what their prices were on the live rock? I'm shopping around for that too...

[boogs]

I've looked high and low for decent live sand in ontario and have yet to find any that's actually affordable and has enough "life" in it to warrant the incredible prices i've seen. I have purchased live rock from AS in Mississauga for $5.25/lb when you buy a box before it's unpacked and have found it to be good quality and a good mix of sizes.

HTH's

Scott

[Metaphase]

Alright, that sounds good. The AS in KW is really small, I should go to Mississauga. I've heard good things about the Scarborough store too. Scott, what % of live to dead sand did you use?

[pluff]

Metaphase under 50LBS its $6.99 and over 50LBS its $6.50...HTH:cool:

[Kenzy]

Meta,

Another option is to join MASK if you're not already. Get to know some fellow reefers in your area and trade some live sand.

MASK (members.rogers.com/maskcanada/mask.htm)