Thinking of going BB. Need guidance please!

[Beverly]

We went BB in our three reefs when we upgraded all three tanks almost two years ago. That meant we removed all the livestock from the existing tank, got rid of the sandbed so we could put the new tank/stand in place of the old tank/stand. Had lots of NSW on hand, but used quite a bit of the old water to fill the new tank. Rock from the old tank was swished in old tank water to remove detritus, and there was LOTS of it.

The sandbeds in each of the three tanks was 2-3" deep. Once everything was out of the tank, I stirred the sandbed really well with the remaining 2-3" of tank water. There was a raunchy rotten egg stench to the water after stirring. These were not what I would consider deep sand beds in the least, yet at least some of the bed had gone anoxic and had released hydrogen sulfide.

Because of the possibility of releasing hydrogen sulfide into your water column, I would suggest you take the time to be safe with your livestock if you go BB and tear down your tank to remove the sandbed. That way, you can get a very clean start, have new aquascaping, and be sure you won't have an unintended disaster on your hands.

Here's a new addition to the Reef Chemistry page on Hydrogen Sulfide and the Reef Aquarium:

http://reefkeeping.com/issues/2005-12/rhf/index.php


Personally, I won't go back to using sandbeds EVER!

[Chad]

I have even heard from the bigest supporter of DSB, Dr Ron, that the deep sand bed is useless if you do not have a sufficently sized aquarium. I forget the exact size that was suggested, but I believe it was atleast 50+ gal. The reasoning was that anything smaller could not sustain enough life to make the DSB functional. It made sense to me.

So, I went from a 20gal with DSB to the 50gal BB. I cannot begin to tell you the crap that was built up in my 20gal. It was thoroughly disgusting. So if you want to keep a sandbed in smaller tanks, you should have a smaller sandbed with lots of vaccuming for ditritus during water changes.

Just my 2cents, 2nd hand knowledge :-D

[Quagmire]

Originally Posted by Chad

I have even heard from the bigest supporter of DSB, Dr Ron, that the deep sand bed is useless if you do not have a sufficently sized aquarium.

I remember reading that also,he was talking about the size of the sand bed needing to be large enough to support all the organizms to brake down detrius from the first step right through the Nitrification/Denitrifacation cycle.But even a small sand bed will help take nitrates out of the water,provided its the correct depth and grain size.But it needs to be kept clean.Or it adds to the Nitrate problem,rather than helping with it.

[Chad]

Originally Posted by Quagmire

I remember reading that also,he was talking about the size of the sand bed needing to be large enough to support all the organizms to brake down detrius from the first step right through the Nitrification/Denitrifacation cycle.But even a small sand bed will help take nitrates out of the water,provided its the correct depth and grain size.But it needs to be kept clean.Or it adds to the Nitrate problem,rather than helping with it.

Correct, it would help with the nitrates by making those oxygen deprived areas. But, his concern was that such a small square footage of sandbed would eventualy become stagnant because it does not support enough life to clean up the bed. Hence the DSB crashes (for smaller tanks)

In short form:

Nitrate sink yes - but cannot export ditritus properly and becomes saturated causing a ton of issues.

Sand in a bucket for a nitrate sink has been passed around lately. But you need to move the water across the bed fast enough so that it does not let ditritus settle. Otherwise you would have the same issue as the small DSB sized tanks.

[Quagmire]

I was thinking that if OCDP found that BB was too hard on his YWG.After he cleaned the old sand from his tank,he could add a couple inches of fine sand in an easy to reach part of the tank.Maybe use a dam so it stays where he wants it.If its easy to reach,he can clean it and his YWG will be happy too.Would take some landscaping,maybe more than he wants to do.But its an option.

[Funky_Fish14]

I dont think this idea is what your looking for, but I tried the faux sand-bed. I absolutely love it so far, couldnt be anything better, I think it throws all the bonuses in one. I have expoxied a sand-bed into the bottom of my 75g tank, and love the results. Basically, you get a sandbed look without all the drawbacks. Syphoning is easy, and it also protects the glass like starboard. The only drawbacks that I have found are that you cannot keep critters that need sand, its not removable, and corraline will grow on it and is hard to get off if you dont want it there. Personaly I like the corraline on it, but if you ever want it off, an urchin would probably do the trick. Also, you could do a high-gloss epoxy finish over it aswell, so that its smooth, but still with the sandbed look.

Just my 2 cents, if anyone wants more info, feel free to ask.

Chris