DSBs revisited (split The Sump thread)

[Anonymous]

Since my 8 inch DSB died, (you want to talk about a mess?) and consequently all my sps shed their skeletons of tissue in a group coral suicide trip

Ack! I'm so sorry, Laura!

We are spending the Christmas Holiday taking the tank down, cleaning it, and re-plumbing, re-aquascaping, widening the overflows, upgrading the lighting on it to make some improvements.

That orange monti cap you can see in the background of my avatar was as big as a dinner plate, and several layers deep. All dead over night.

PitPat is in the basement as I type plumbing a stock tank into the sump in the basement so we will have somewhere to put the two big tangs when we take the display tank down.

The tank will rise up better than before, but now it is really depressing.

Although, the good side is I am getting a lighting upgrade when we set it back up!

I am so glad my husband likes the tanks as much as I do. He built a neat new hood that gets the lights away from the water, which is an issue I always had with our old hood.

 

[Anonymous]

Are you going DSB again?

 

[Anonymous]

I guess that post could have gone topside now that I look at it LOL, I guess I have been too depressed about the tank to talk about it, plus I know why it happened.

 

[Anonymous]

Are you going DSB again?

http://reefcentral.com/forums/showthrea ... did=257196

http://www.thereeftank.com/forums/showt ... adid=23293

http://www.thereeftank.com/forums/showt ... adid=24955

http://reefcentral.com/forums/showthrea ... did=210605

http://reefcentral.com/forums/showthrea ... did=251077

 

[Anonymous]

Oh, believe me, I've read all the hullaballoo. I want to know if Laura and PitPat are giving it another go.

HD

 

[Anonymous]

Are you going DSB again?

I have a small sandbed that is in my 40 gallon tank with my anemone that is still healthy. Since it is in a glass tank, I can see through the sides that it is full of life, and my LTA needs the deep sand for it's foot. This tank is plumbed into my larger system with the 155, and I will leave the DSB there, but in the main tank or my 150g sump, no. If I use them, I will carefully monitor sandbeds from here on out. I had become lazy, with my DSB in the 150 gallon sump, I was able to feed heavely and not ever have an issue with excess nutrients. So to tell you the truth I slacked off on water testing and such, because everything was always on the mark for years. I thought my hair algae was caused by my source water (it may in have have played a part) so I goofed around trying to fix all this other stuff when the DSB was accumilating detritus in big hills in the back where it was very hard to see.

I always had 0 nitrates before going DSB, so I don't think I need to put it back in. Removing a dead DSB is pure nastyness, really gross, heavy, full of dead worms, and what to do with all the sand?

I plan to go back to a more Berlin system, lots of rock, heavy skimming, intense light and lots of current. Probably a light layer of live sand just for the biodiversity, but I will keep and eye on it and change part of it if it looks dirty.

 

[Anonymous]

Oh, believe me, I've read all the hullaballoo. I want to know if Laura and PitPat are giving it another go.

HD

Aye. I was posting that in case Laura had not seen the threads.

What's your take on it then HD? I'm sure then you know how I feel about them, but I am curious how/whether what we discussed was interpreted or accepted by other aquarists. I haven't gotten much feedback besides the typical "You're obviously an idiot because you're going against what Dr. Ron has told us" type stuff, which isn't very constructive or helpful, and I'm genuinely curious.

Bare bottom/equal export systems may be a "trend" in the hobby, but they are the standard for a successful coral culture/research laboratory, and have been since Tom Vaughan spawned P. porites in the 19th century. Some labs have had success with *true* Jaubert Microceans, which utilize intentional anaerobic filtration effectively, but mainly in the short term. None of them will touch DSB's though, unless they are trying to model imbalance in import vs. export (ie, the models for the Florida Bay crash were essentially DSB -based aquariums, and the reason Florida Bay crashed was the same basic reason your DSB crashes).

 

[Anonymous]

Am I reading that you believe DSBs are worthwhile, Chris? I have a 6" myself that has been in my tank for 3 years, but I also have hermits and a cucumber. This is easily the biggest issue I worry about concerning my tank.

Chris

 

[Anonymous]

Sigh... Dr. Ron. No offense intended to the good doctor, but who can deny that he was instrumental in getting us all to use DSBs to begin with?

Next tank I set up will have some sand in it, but probably not a DSB.

 

[Anonymous]

Am I reading that you believe DSBs are worthwhile, Chris?

If you want a high nutrient system that you're fine with replacing every so often, sure. My arguments in those threads don't support DSB's, in fact just the opposite.

For the most part, they have no place in what I do.

 

[Anonymous]

I'm thinking of slowly siphoning mine out a little at a time over a few months. I was a believer in them, but I've heard too many negatives from VERY reliable sources reporting problems long term.
I figure that if nothing else, I'm at least eliminating a POSSIBLE problem.

Jim

 

[Anonymous]

Okay...now I'm getting what you are saying.

I wonder if I should start slowly reducing the height of my DSB.

Something to think about!

 

[Anonymous]

Ya'll have prompted a necessary MOVED for this thread.

Can you not see the irony that a thread wholly about the sump turns into a serious discussion about reef keeping?
. :wink:

 

[Anonymous]

Chris, I'd worry that messing w/ the DSB would liberate nutrients into your water - provided that it is correct that over time the DSBs become nutrient sinks.
The whole debate leads me to ask what the alternative is? Some kind of thin substrate that'll be vaccumed? Won't we inevitably miss spots and have nutrient sinks?

 

[Anonymous]

Chris, I'd worry that messing w/ the DSB would liberate nutrients into your water

I do...but I'm wondering if that is the lesser of two evils.

Fish...ironic is the right word!

 

[Anonymous]

Aye. I was posting that in case Laura had not seen the threads.

Thanks. I read parts of them when I was first coming to terms with the fact that the sandbed was dead.

 

[Anonymous]

Moe, if by alternatives you mean other ways of export, using a bare bottom (or white HDPE, cutting board material), allows high flow to maintain any detritus/organics produced to stay suspended. This means more food for coral, no trapping/sinking by a sandbed, and almost immediate efficient removal by a high power skimmer (which will also offgass orthophosphates) and UV (which will photodegrade organophosphates).

This is what's generally catch phrased as a "equal" or "full" export system. ie, almost anything that isn't consumed or used, is exported, just like on a real reef.

Chris, I'd worry that messing w/ the DSB would liberate nutrients into your water - provided that it is correct that over time the DSBs become nutrient sinks.

This can happen, and really impact your livestock's health with organic overload. Well, all the models and all the peer reviewed (in other words, nothing that Ron has ever written on sandbed ecology...none of it is peer reviewed or academic in nature) shows a sandbed of this nature to be a sink. There was even a thread on RC where someone dug up a lot of said literature.

It's why Florida Bay crashed. Flushing from the glades stopped in the early 20th century, and there were no major flushing hurricanes. Florida bay became one giant DSB. After several decades of holding imported and produced material, it filled up, began leaching, and became eutrophic: "crashed"

 

[Len]

If I may, can I split this topic up and move the pertinent info topside? I'll shadow it down here if you guys prefer (I know some of you are afraid of the bright lights) There is a lot of good discussion here that I think should be shared in the GRD.

 

[Anonymous]

Works for me

 

[Anonymous]

Has anyone slowly reduced the size of their DSB...and if so, how exactly was it done (i.e. length of time, amount removed, etc)?

Chris