Clean my sand or not?

[Midway]

My lfs guys told me that i should clean my sand because i could be growing harmful bacteria and other bad stuff in there. Do you guys clean your sand or not? If you do why and if you don't why not?

Thanks for your inputs guys.

[ashr]

i have fish and other things that clean/shift my sand for me. i never clean it

[bignose]

You could vacuum the very top of the sand but otherwise leave it up to livestock. Depending on what's in your sand you could potentially crash your system.

[Snaz]

There are different bacteria that contribute to the breakdown of ammonia and nitrite and some of them are anaerobic and can only survive in an area of ZERO oxygen like a deep sandbed.

The display tanks without sand certainly have sumps that contain sand. You need that anaerobic environment.

So don't mess with your sand too much!

[Myka]

Don't disturb more than the top 1/2" of a sandbed. Deeper sand will have anaerobic areas, and if you disturb them they will get oxygen making them aerobic which will cause that bacteria to die which may cause an ammonia spike in your tank. Unhealthy anaerobic areas may contain hydrogen sulphide (sand looks black and stinks), which if released into your tank may cause the tank to crash.

Originally Posted by Snaz

The display tanks without sand certainly have sumps that contain sand. You need that anaerobic environment.

This is not true. Anaerobic bacteria also inhabit live rock, so anaerobic areas in sand are not needed. Very simply, anaerobic bacteria convert nitrate to nitrogen gas which off-gases from the tank.

[Snaz]

Originally Posted by Myka

Don't disturb more than the top 1/2" of a sandbed. Deeper sand will have anaerobic areas, and if you disturb them they will get oxygen making them aerobic which will cause that bacteria to die which may cause an ammonia spike in your tank. Unhealthy anaerobic areas may contain hydrogen sulphide (sand looks black and stinks), which if released into your tank may cause the tank to crash.



This is not true. Anaerobic bacteria also inhabit live rock, so anaerobic areas in sand are not needed. Very simply, anaerobic bacteria convert nitrate to nitrogen gas which off-gases from the tank.

Certainly LR contain anaerobes but it would have to be the larger pieces if were to contain any significant populations wouldn't you say? The fact that we practice to get lots of flow through the rock also hinders the chance of good anaerobes in medium or smaller pieces like that would be found in nano or medium sized tanks.

Really I just would not mess with a good deep sandbed in any way. If you disturb the anaerobes as you say you could have a spike or a crash and as you mention they are a nitrogen sink which as we know is always needed in a reef environment, another reason not to mess with them.

And in regards to the original post. Most LFS advice is BS with apologies to the people who work at an LFS and provide good advice... you are a rare breed.