Sand vs no sand?

[kien]

Or you could just go bare bottom. A sandbed sure sounds like a heck of a lot of work for little to no benefit !

[hfp75]

Remember that bare bottem, 'area' LxW in inches has bacteria growing on it.... and is flat

A single piece of sand, if it were a cube (surface area LxWxH), 1mm on all sides has a total of 6mm of area that bacteria can live on. So, 1mm (of flat) vs 6mm per layer of 1mm sand. By adding sand your good bacteria have 100s if not 1,000s (%) of increased area to live on which is good for the tank (depending on how much sand you add it could be millions or 10x's of millions).

You just need to take care of it.


* Don't forget we are talking about sand in a display tank so it doesn't need to be crazy deep. Its not a 'Deep Sand Bed', most people choose the wrong size of sand (& depth) for their display tank....