Loss of Refugium
 

My 55 gal sump sat in an unheated moving truck yesterday for 2 hours. The mangroves lost all of their leaves (they were not supposed to be on the truck!) and I'm wondering if I should toss the live sand before I start the tank up again. There was about 5 inches of sand in one of the compartments in the sump in which the mangroves were planted. Should I start with new sand?

Two hours of sub zero temperature was probably enough to kill off everything at surface , however with that much of a sand base there should of been some servival of bacteria and other life to keep the sand viable.... IMO I would keep the sand

your def going to see an amonia spike if you use that same sand although some life may survive theres def die off which in turn means amonia......just give it a good clean rinse and your good to go.....if you see a spike in amonia just have some ammo lock on hand:) cheers

Dumb question - "giving the sand a good rinse" - in tap water, RO water or salt water??

rinse
 

in saltwater , if you use fresh you will kill the rest of the good stuff

I think that would be a waste of perfectly good saltwater, as you'll have to rinse it for a while.

There's probably too much die-off in the sand already, so it's not worth trying to save it.

I'd shove a garden hose into the sand, and let it overflow into the back yard for a day or 2.

Better safe than worry about an ammonia spike.

I had sand sit over night in my basement last week< water was fairly cool< placed sand in my refuigium and check my nitrate level few days later and they were elevated but not to high>>> I would rinse your sand out good and giver a go....

+2 after 2 hrs sub zero temp your getting die off regardless so just rinse with whatever water you have......using a fish net thats fine and a garden hose has worked well numerous times for me in the past:):)


your not wanting "live sand" your wanting completey clean lifeless sand as you want to add it to an already living system;) what ever you use will evenyually become " live" :):)

I'm going to take the sand out of the sump and place in a large bucket to rinse it really well in RO water. I'm not wanting to risk any spikes as the liverock has already gone through a mini cycle in a separate tank because of the move and should be good to go in a day or so.