I was a certified building materials laboratory tech, expert in concrete mix designs that use those sands, and registered special inspector of high rise construction for 28 years. I happen to know that the sands we are all discussing have a specific gravity of 2.65 +/- 0.02= 2.65 times the weight of an equal volume of pure water.
I know it is fine and easily siphoned out but not if the flow control is handled more carefully.
Practice more until you get the flow just right and you can clean the sand as I have described. I'm using sand in my 125 gal planted Discus tank finer than anything you guys can buy. All that purchased sand was sieved to meet a specification. I collected it from a high mountain river.
I designed a special pipe system running under the sand and pump oxygenated water from the bottom up through it to prevent it from going anaerobic.