Carib Sea ACS05840 Super Naturals Crystal River Sand for Aquarium, 5-Pound

Bought one bag for my 5.5 gallon to switch from gravel. About an inch of sand, rinsed it thoroughly and had cloudy water for the first two days or so but cleared up pretty nice. Didn’t have to use the packet of clarifier it came with. Very fine sand, looks pretty nice but make sure you turn off you filter before messing with it so it doesn’t get sucked up.3 weeks later, no cloudiness at all and my fish is doing fine. If you have a bigger tank maybe consider buying more than one bag. Much cheaper than the petsmart sand and I would buy again.

There are two versions of the Crystal River Sand from Caribsea. One is just the sand. The other comes packed pre-cultured with nitrifying bacteria.The version that comes pre-cultured with nitrifying bacteria will come in the same plastic bag, but the sand will be moist. And it is not recommended that you rinse it out. Within the bag, you will find two small packets. One is a dechlorinator. The other contains a floculant, to help clear cloudy water. If you are starting a new tank, this is the one that I would recommend. It helps eliminate deadly ammonia spikes. Naturally, you will still want to start with hardy fish until the tank stabilizes.This is a beautiful substrate. The grain size will range from fine to medium. The size is large enough that you can vacuum the bottom without losing too much of your substrate in the siphon hose. This is the ideal size, in my opinion, for most situations. The grains are small enough so that fish feces and other debris cannot work their way into the substrate. And yet, large and heavy enough not to get too much of it get siphoned out during tank maintenance. Some fish species, like Corydoras and German Rams prefer a fine, sand substrate like this."Crystal" comes from some small, clear grains that catch the light and actually shine. Almost like a sparkle, but not bright. You can use this in a fish-only tank or you can even use this as the substrate for a planted tank. This could very well be the perfect substrate, except for one thing. If you have bright lights, algae will grow on this sand. And that ruins the beauty of it. Darker sand still grows algae, but hides it.Bottom line. If you can keep your tank clean, this is perfect for you. If you are slack on maintenance, pick a darker sand. There is a black sand from the same manufacturer called Tahitian Moon. It is slightly finer and it hides algae very well.Oh, and one other thing. If you keep rainbows, they will tend to exhibit their best colors when their sand is dark.Update: I bought a five-pound bag to replace the small amount that I lose through the gravel vacuum hose during each water change. Some will leave the tank when you get rid of unwanted plants too.

I've recently upgraded my betta Lenny to a 5-gallon tank and decided to go with sand as opposed to gravel. I'm very happy I did this because he loves the sand! It is so soft, he loves to rest on the sand, or glide around on it. This package was also the perfect amount to cover a 5-gallon tank. It was super easy to set up, literally just follow the instructions on the package to rinse it, and after adding it to the tank, add the water clearing liquid it comes with into the water and you'll be good to go. I've yet to clean the sand as I've only had it for a week, but I don't anticipate it will be much of a challenge.

I received this aquarium sand yesterday. I bought it primarily because I purchased five assassin snails and the love sand. I have a 50 gallon established freshwater tank. I already have soils and gravel at the bottom for my live plants, but assassin snails need sand, and this sand had great reviews. Cleaning it was easy and I just followed the directions on the bag. Waited 30 minutes for the sand to settle before reintroducing the fish to the aquarium. My Corydoras are having a field day! I am infested with mystery snails, so I’m excited to see if assassin snails help with the population and love seeing the pretty sand in my tank. Highly recommend.

Looks and feel fine but it is hard to rinse off when needed