I'll likely be trying out the Eheim sludge extractor for sandbed maintenance. It's not terribly expensive and will be pretty convenient...

Try to siphon it down to a lower level somehow (basement or run the hose outside). Otherwise, use a shop vac. You can siphon or pump out the clean water first, save it, then use the shop vac on the bottom.

Haven't found a pump that doesn't plug up when I do that job. I just use a baster into a filter sock.

I put big non-reef safe inverts like chocolate chip stars, general stars, green Philippine (fish eating) serpent stars, urchins, big hermits, and crabs in the sump. They are voracious feeders and will eat detritus if that's all that is available.

Alternatively, a diatom filter will polish the water in the sump. Turn off the sump return pump and stir it up for the diatom to pull it out.

My sump is on the basement floor, pretty much the lowest level possible. I wanted to put the sump on a stand, but I need room for 2 more tanks about the sump....

That basement has to have a floor drain some where...

Maybe just pick up some used Korallia 3's or 4's and just have them on in the sump. It probably won't be a perfectly 100% detritus-free sump but the spots where it does collect will be hopefully smaller and thus easier to suck it up with a turkey baster.

In Big Als here in Calgary, they have a demo-reef tank with a sump that has 5 or 6 skimmers in it. The sump is so churned up that there is no detritus in it at all. So it's possible to have a clean sump but most of us aren't heavily overskimming like that (and I don't recall if the tank has any fish in it, so it might be all low-bioload stuff anyhow).

Don't tell me the force of gravity is going top stop you :)

If your sump is sloped, which can be as easy as shimming it, the detritus will settle at the low end. Set up the shop vac for a quick 10 second suction to pull out the detritus and leave the rest of the water.

Used to use a Fluval Canister filter modified with slightly longer hoses. Ran it with no media and output hose in a filtersock. Worked great for me. :wink: