Keeping a Clean Sand Bed

[Steve...]

Hi All,

Whats the best way of keeping a sand bed nice and white? I use to have a Orange Spotted Goby long time ago that cleaned the sand but was always a pain by causing a mess in the tank.Any other good alternatives?

[apexifd]

Fighting conch.

[Wheelman76]

I have two strawberry conches and they do a really good job of keeping the sand clean.

[Mike-fish]

Would a conch be ok with 11/2" sand bed with egg crate in it.

[Wheelman76]

I don't see why not , they don't really bury under the sand.

[Myka]

Conchs work pretty well, but vacuuming the sand to its entire depth during waterchanges works best. There is risk to vacuuming the sand if the sand is already established though because you can run into anaerobic areas and sudden exposure of those areas can cause toxic effects. How deep is the sand?

[spit.fire]

Originally Posted by Myka

Conchs work pretty well, but vacuuming the sand to its entire depth during waterchanges works best. There is risk to vacuuming the sand if the sand is already established though because you can run into anaerobic areas and sudden exposure of those areas can cause toxic effects. How deep is the sand?

+1 I vacuum my sand bed once a week after I feed my nps corals (excessive I know) and my tank stays pretty much spotless...

[Son Of Skyline]

+2 keep a shallow sandbed and vacuum it regularly. If its too deep and established, try easing into it. Vacuum the top 1cm and in a couple weeks go another cm etc. That's kind of what a sand sifting goby might do anyway.