hillbilly":214fa2v6 said:
Vaccuming the sand bed goes against what the DSB proponent Dr Ron always said, so no, I don't think many people vaccum thier bed.
Just curious, how long have you had your sandbed up? Mine worked GREAT for years, so great in fact that I was very slow to put the blame on it for my incresing hair algae.
I have a 55 gal. that has had a DSB since 1997.
I never put much faith in what Dr. Ron says. Not
that I think he is a quack, it's just that I tend to do what works for me regardless of what everyone else is doing.
I think you need some way to get rid of excess fish crap and uneaten food.
I never put much faith in what Dr. Ron says. Not
that I think he is a quack, it's just that I tend to do what works for me regardless of what everyone else is doing.
I think you need some way to get rid of excess fish crap and uneaten food.
There are a number of fundamental ecological differences between a DSB in an aquarium and sand in the vicinity of a wild reef. Significantly, aquariums lack large specialized predators that methodically remove animals from the sandbed. This results in large-scale export of nutrients by way of the food chain (think grunts, sweetlips, goatfish, sleeper gobies, etc) in the wild. There is nothing like this going on in an aquarium and aquarists usually want to preserve any sandbed fauna. Except for the macro-animals, vacuuming a sandbed somewhat replicates a fish plowing through the substrate and eating what it finds.
I tend to disagree with the 'science' used to buttress theories of captive DSB coming from Shimek, Goemans & Gamble, etc.
I tend to disagree with the 'science' used to buttress theories of captive DSB coming from Shimek, Goemans & Gamble, etc.
I agree John. You have to get rid of all those excessive nutrients, or they will just keep building until the whole thing crashes. As the tank matures and animals get larger, the need to export excessive nutrients becomes more important than ever. That's why I vaccum along with my regular part water changes. Makes sense to me at least.
I'm going to have to agree with you guys. I had a CC substrate (with a UF) from 91-00, and vacuumed regularly, and had good luck fish lived for 5-6 years, etc. Went essentially BB with 1/2 of aragontite for two years and had algae problems, had to clean more frequently, some mini-crashes. Been running a 3.5-4" oolitic sand bed since March and finally been able to keep corals like I want. Lately been expirementing with a vacuuming routine, and seeing very positive results. Did have a pod crash, but think that was a pH fluctuation due to me not adding enough kalk for a coupla weeks.
liquid":cf03mz1c said:
Shane it's a Amblygobius rainfordi - a.k.a. Rainford's Goby / Court Jester Goby. Docile, does well in small groups , it is however a sifter and needs a large system to thrive. I thought about doing a small group in my 220 but am afraid they would run out of food - one seems to be doing very well in a tankthis size.
liquid":3e7mk0sw said:
They are very shy and retiring little fish. Since you have no true bottom dwellers my guess is they would leave him be. Mine rarely leaves the bottom 1/4 of the tank and just goes back and forth poking around in the sand and rock. Word of warning - they like to swim around with a mouth full of sand exploring and may drop some sand on any corals / clams you may have resting near the bottom.
No one picks on mine but again he always makes it a point to get out of the way when one of the larger fish comes by.
galleon":1jf6qz97 said:
How about adding a Dwyer flowmeter on the output of the UV sterilizer and then plumbing it back into the skimmer. That would allow you to obtain an accurate flow rate as well plus you'd be injecting it back into the skimmer.
Thoughts?
Shane
I wish I would have asked for help when I was having problems with my tank. My tank developed an algea problem on a scale I have never seen before, in any tank. I was looking to everything else as the problem. Changed my bulbs, massively upgraded my RO unit, cut feeding WAY back, stopped kalking my mojano anemones, bought a better pump for my skimmer, we went to doing nearly daily water changes siphoning the hair algae off the rock. I really learned a lesson about having an open mind. To tell you the truth I had stopped browsing the General discussion forums here and at RC, because for the most part is seemed such a rehash of old topics. I thought I knew how to get rid of hair algae in a reef tank, I was so wrong. And to think, there are 50 page threads out there outlining my exact problem. It is just so sad, I feel like such a smuck. And to think I installed a DSB years ago not to correct any problem, but because everything I was reading at the time gave me the impression that this was THE WAY to have a healthy ecosystem. I could just cry for all the corals that I lost while I was going down the wrong road trying to fix my problems, many acros, including three table acros that were flourishing, (given to me by a friend because his tank was not doing so well and MY sps always looked SO NICE 
) a yellow Sarcophyton elegans, a pocillopora, stylophora, lots of caulastrea, several odd montiporas that I had collected from friends, the bulk of my orange, green and purple M. digitata, my orange M. capricornis, S. histrix (that really hurt to see it go, I swear it would be like a spiky basketball now) as well as numerous zoanthids. Nearly lost a Macrodactyla doreensis given to me by my MOTHER who has had it in captivity since well before you even dare mention you owned anemone of a reef board for fear of flames. (It is now obviously on the mends)
I just was baffled, "Why am I getting phosphate reading when I have never ever had measurable phosphate?" I think the DIRT that was in my sandbed when I took it out can answer that.
It was weired what survived though, I should write a post "Want hardy corals? Here is what survives really bad water in my tank."
I am so humbled. I should have known better that to just follow current fad so BLINDLY. It's just that when I tried a DSB, it worked really well for long enough that I just believed it would keep working forever as long as I gave it the occasional recharge of live critters.
) a yellow Sarcophyton elegans, a pocillopora, stylophora, lots of caulastrea, several odd montiporas that I had collected from friends, the bulk of my orange, green and purple M. digitata, my orange M. capricornis, S. histrix (that really hurt to see it go, I swear it would be like a spiky basketball now) as well as numerous zoanthids. Nearly lost a Macrodactyla doreensis given to me by my MOTHER who has had it in captivity since well before you even dare mention you owned anemone of a reef board for fear of flames. (It is now obviously on the mends)I just was baffled, "Why am I getting phosphate reading when I have never ever had measurable phosphate?" I think the DIRT that was in my sandbed when I took it out can answer that.
It was weired what survived though, I should write a post "Want hardy corals? Here is what survives really bad water in my tank."
I am so humbled. I should have known better that to just follow current fad so BLINDLY. It's just that when I tried a DSB, it worked really well for long enough that I just believed it would keep working forever as long as I gave it the occasional recharge of live critters.
There will never be an absolute way to do things. I've been doing this quite a while and every new technique that comes along is always proven to have flaws down the road. It's just the nature of what we're trying to achieve in a small enclosed ecosystem. I like a lot of people try to keep simplicity in the way I go about getting things done. I can never see myself getting involved with all the fancy contraptions and gizmos that come out. It would take the pleasure out of it for me. That being said I have been watching one of my tanks with a great pleasure. Its a 45 gallon tank. the tank is as simple as you possibly can make it. I have 120 watts of regular fluorescent lighting. 100 pounds of live rock and a few powerheads that it. I have six different types of soft coral that are growing like crazy. I really have to start to frag some of them to make room. The only thing I ever do is replaced some of the water once a month. No additional types and additives whatsoever. The biggest factories I believe that are contributing to my success is the amount of live rock. and I don't have to worry about changing water parameters because nothing else goes into the water. [/quote][/code]
_________________
Honda CB250RS
_________________
Honda CB250RS
Sponsor Reefs
We're a FREE website, and we exist because of hobbyists like YOU who help us run this community.
Click here to sponsor $10:
