Corys and Onyx Sand

echoofformless

echoofformless

Peat Advocate & Defender Of Snails
Oct 1, 2005
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Phil Uh Del Feeya
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Okay, so here goes once again - after a few months of living in my 55g with Onyx Sand as the substrate, I ended up with three emerald greens without barbels. This is the second trio of corys that have succumbed to this and so I'm pretty well convinced now that it's the sand.

It's not really just sand - it's like a mixture of coarse gravel pieces and sand of varying grain sizes. The other elements of decor are round, smooth river rocks and some driftwood. I have been suspicious of the stuff since I set up the tank - it just looks really sharp and uncomfortable for a sensitive apendage like barbels.

The last trio of corys died within months from their loss of barbels. Everyone on the forums insisted that I must not have been caring for the substrate enough and so they got a bacterial infection. I was somewhat lax in my maintenance schedule so I thought it a logical conclusion and decided to try again.

But now I have the same issue with the brochis. The last one died a few days ago. And I had been maintaining the substrate with a rigorously thorough weekly cleaning. They went from having really long, healthy barbels to nothing within two to three months...no different than the corys before them.


I'm concluding that Onyx Sand is no good for corys/brochis. Anyone else have experience to the contrary or to the accord?

I'm thinking of switching to a mixture of medium sand and soilmaster select.

Anyone?
 
it sounds like you've found the culprit. to complete the 'experiment', get rid of the onyx and see if things improve.
 
True true...but is soilmaster select "cory safe?" That's my only worry. I don't want to go through the trouble of replacing the substrate in a well established tank only to have the same problem again. Seeing fish suffer is never fun, as you all well know.
 
i've neither seen nor heard of soilmaster substrate ... in my experience, the best substrate for corydoras and other 'feeler' types is very small rounded gravel ... something in the size range of 2 mm.
 
I've had good luck with the Quikrete Medium Sand. It has a nice soft, rounded and evenly sized grain structure. The only thing is I really want a black color.

Someone mentioned somewhere that Home Depot sells a black quartz sand...does anyone know of this?
 
At the Planet Catfish forum I saw people being warned away from onyx sand. If it looks and feels sharp to you, it is definitely problematic for the cories. I just had horrendous trouble with even the rounded Estes gravel and had to make a switch to river sand myself. The problem I had was that the Estes had irregular sizes and shapes of grains and food was getting stuck in it and the cories could not get to it even a few seconds after putting the food into the tank. I got CaribSea Peace River Sand and CaribSea Torpedo Beach Sand--both of which should not affect the pH of a freshwater tank. I mixed the two together and my cories are loving it so far. I got the Peace River from AquariumPros.com and the Torpedo Beach sand from ThatPetPlace.com and the cost with shipping was high. However I went with this option because I needed a very clean sand that wouldn't kick up a lot of dust when I went to rinse it. It's winter and very icy here and I couldn't wash the sand outside. I didn't want to pollute my house with sand dust.

The sand was VERY clean to begin with and easy to rinse by using a fine-mesh hand-strainer from a home goods store's kitchen selection. I rinsed the sand under the tap, threw it into a bucket filled with water, swirled the bucket once it was full, poured off the dirty water, then repeated with another rinse through the strainer and a final couple of rinses in the bucket using dechlorinated water. Try to keep the water lukewarm so it won't throw off the temperature in your tank. And you may need extra rinsings depending on how thorough you're being at each step.

I had very minimal dusting and clouding when I followed these steps with the CaribSea products. Still, if I were to do it all over again, I'd put something like a sponge over my filter intake. My impeller chamber DID get clogged during the switchover. But I haven't had any problems since.

So that you don't lose your established bacteria entirely, bag up some of it in a cheap filter media bag and let the bags full of old substrate sit in your tank for about a week to help seed your new sand with bacteria.

These sands are also a lot easier to maintain than gravel. If you gravel vac, just don't bring the vac down into the sand. I have a gravel vac that actually does let me get down into the sand to stir it up, and I get the debris and only a very few grains at a time. I forget what brand it was but it was from PetsMart and has a flared out plastic bottom...it's all clear acrylic construction.

If cost is a factor (after watching my fish struggle with the gravel it was no longer a factor for me) then the sands from the Home Depot should work, too, though I hear they are much dirtier and need lots of rinsing. I think someone mentioned a QuickKrete sand on another forum. Sorry, I don't know what to recommend if you go this route because I had made up my mind to use sand specifically packaged for aquarium use. I was too chicken to try anything else at that point.

p.s. Oh duh...there you go, several posts above mine...the QuickKrete recommendation by your own self! Sorry, I'd missed it! If you want black sand...CaribSea Tahitian Moon sand was recommended to me. Someone wrote to CaribSea and found out their disclaimer about it not being for bottom dwellers was pretty much over-cautious. However, it's a lot finer grained than what you've been looking at.
 
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Cute PS hellocatfish! hehe

TKOS - Corys' diet was mainly sinking shrimp pellets with the addition of sinking vegetable tablets once a week or so. Same diet I feed the corys in my other tanks. Nitrate levels are never much more than 5ppm as the tank is fairly well planted.

I'm really hoping someone knows if Soilmaster Select Pro is "cory safe." I'm very interested in it.
 
I've got the Tahitian Moon in my 55 and all 7 cories are fine--been in there for @8 months. Brochis, arched, and peppered.
 
Just wanted to say this is a great thread. :) I'm going to change the substrate in my 29g because food and stuff is getting stuck in the gravel and wearing down my cories barbels (and causing infections!). Its heavily planted so I can't vaccuum it all, which is part of the problem.

I'm changing to Eco Complete though. Its probably the same consistency of Onyx sand, but I have it in my 55g with 3 types of cories and some Yoyo loaches, all of which have nice sized barbels. :) I thought about using AquariumPlants.com's substrate (which has been compared to Turface, which is like Soilmaster), but I'm worried about the KH drop that happens with it. Its pretty small, so might be ok for cories (as is the Soilmaster), but I'd just be worried about sharp pieces.

I'm interested to see if anyone on here uses Soilmaster with cories. Sorry I couldn't help ya any!
 
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