Fine sand or crushed coral for wrasse

ahiggins · Feb 17, 2017

Hey all!
I have a (Halichoeres chrysus) on order and some very fine sand.
What's the best grain of sand to use? I feel like the soft stuff will solidify after a while. But I don't want to scratch the new wrasse either!
What do you think?

Cary Meredith · Feb 17, 2017

IMO stay away from crushed coral

nemo1017 · Feb 17, 2017

Cary Meredith said:
IMO stay away from crushed coral

+1

ahiggins · Feb 17, 2017

Thanks

I'll take any opinions I can get

saltyhog · Feb 17, 2017

I like the little larger sand since I have a lot of flow in my tank. It's still plenty small for sand sleeping wrasse. Mine is CaribSea Special Grade.

dragon99 · Feb 17, 2017

A fine sand should be perfectly fine. My h. crysus seems happy with Tropic Eden reef flake which is ~3mm grains.

ahiggins · Feb 18, 2017

Thanks!!

laga77 · Feb 18, 2017

I have had this guy for over 3 years. Since he was less than 2 inches long. He is now 7 inches. The whole time has been crushed coral substrate. Over time you will find crushed coral easier to clean than sand.

ahiggins · Feb 18, 2017

Well he is in the frag tank (all my other tanks have bigger grains, easy to siphon) but this guy just gets a Tupperware with sand lol

fishkeeper2 · Feb 18, 2017

Definitely fine sand. My wrasse buries himself in it nightly.

ahiggins · Feb 18, 2017

Good that's what I have

ahiggins · Feb 18, 2017

What happens if a sand burying wrasse doesn't have sand? Does it stress him till he dies?

Abhishek · Feb 18, 2017

Well my blue star leopard was in BB tank for a couple of years .
No, it didn;t die but what I have seen is it looses the habit of burrowing through the sand. When it was transfereed to a tank with Reef flakes, for the first week, it didn't realise that it should burrow through the sand and was sleeping on top of the sand.
But its does way better in a tank with sand than one without. Better to provide them with a sand bed.

Regards,
Abhishek

ahiggins · Feb 18, 2017

Thanks

I've just always been told to use sand with the diggers but no one ever said why really. Other than the obvious natural behaviors

MIchael10101 · Apr 19, 2017

Jumping in on this thread. I have had the feared problem with crushed coral and I agree that eventually it will cause a build up of detritus. When discussing removing the crushed coral, could I just cover it with sand? I plan on removing as much as possible, but with a fair amount around rocks and an inability to get to the stuff that's in the back, could I just cover it with fresh sand? And/or is there any clean up crew that can adequately clean crush coral?