Do you clean your sand bed?
 

Hi,

I am wondering is it good to vacumm my sand bed sucking out the waste (1.5 inch sand bed). If yes, how do you do it? Vacumm just at the surface or go all the way down to the bottom completely clean?

Thanks

I just lightly vacuum the surface without disturbing the bed

During water changes, I use a siphon hose to suck out any detritus on the surface, then I gently stir my sandbed in it's entirety hovering above it with the siphon as I stir. If you haven't done this before, this can be very dangerous since an undisturbed sandbed will often have areas of Hydrogen sulfide (black stinky patches), and the release of these areas can lead to a major algae bloom, and possibly crash the tank.

If you haven't stirred the sandbed before, but want to start you need to start off slowly by only stirring maybe 10% of the sandbed per week. Each week do your old 10% plus a new 10%, and keep up on it.

I used to do the above unitl I got my Yellow head sleeper goby now I never touch it as it's always clean, I call here Catherine (my wifes name!) :rolleyes:

Nice!!!! :rofl:

stuff
 

Sand sifting stars and dragon gobies. Get them and you won't be touching the sand bed too much after that.

I stirred up my sandbed in my personal tank at home, and killed my frogspawn after some bacteria got into it.

Ken - BWA

Go
 

I rarely touch my sand bad but this is good to know.
________
NEW MEXICO DISPENSARIES

I have sand dwelling critters too. I'm a big fan of Fighting Conches and Orange Lipped Conches. I don't like sand sifting starfish because they are predatory, and will strip the sandbed of pretty much all life. I really like Rainford's Gobies for sifting.

Just go BB ! (bare bottom) no cleaning no steering, no problem

If we go to most LFS, they do not use sand at all and recommend us not to because sand bed requires major cleaning or issues would arrive (algae bloom on the sand)

I know some of us have critters to take care of the sand bed and do not touch the sand bed. I have 5 nassarius snails and they are doing an OK job but some spots they do not touch; these spots are now covered with brown diatom. I assume the occurence of diatom because of the accumulation of the detris and waste that have never been clean out. Therefore, I figure that I should be more active in the cleaning processes.

Through reading from your responses, I assume that if the critters are not doing enough job of cleaning the subtrate, then I should siphon the substrate more often. Correct me if my assumption is not correct.