Barebottom, thick sand bed, or minimum sand

[JedClampett]

Pros and cons of each? And show pictures. I'm still deciding on what I want to do. Thx

 

[melypr1985]

Your missing one.... medium sand bed. I like sand in my tank, and never really cared for the look of bare bottom. A deep sand bed is usually 4 inches or more and can be very beneficial if taken care of properly. My sand bed is about 2-3 inches depending on where you measure. It's not deep enough to require much special care, but not thin enough to keep me from being able to have fish that like to burrow in the sand. Take that into your considerations..... the fish and critters you want to keep. Some need a certain amount of sand to be happy and healthy.

 

[Sabellafella]

 

[melypr1985]

Yeah... like that ^^

 

[Sabellafella]

Inch and a half for me and i also have a bare bottom basically anything under 2 inches your going to have to clean the sand once a month, aragonite acts as a buffer , imo i used to used a deep sandbed but everyyear i hadda add more sand cause it melts away over time nd its litterally a ticking timebomb untill you disturbe it

 

[Sabellafella]

And barebottom is more of a system to control your amount of nutrients better for coloring sps but i like the sand look

 

[Eckolancer]

 

[TriggerThis]

5" deep talcom powder sand

 

[Jimbo]

First time I've gone with the barebottom. Best advantage for me is being able to have a large amount of flow and not have to worry about sand being blown around. It's also nice to be able to see any detritus build up and just syphion it out. I'm sure it will be much easier to control nutrients in the tank.

I went with cutting board on the bottom. I have to admit it takes some getting used to. It's growing on me but I do like the look of sand in the tank. I figure if it really starts to bother me it's easy enough to add some sand. So far so good though. Here's a pic

 

[TriggerThis]

Here's an older pic but it shows better the depth

 

[Chefbill]

Medium sugar fine. Took a week or two but once it gets water log slashed covered and bacteria / whatever it sank to the bottom and is pretty much stayed put ever since. I have many rashes in my tank so I needed at least a three or four inch then bed

 

[Newb73]

I went with just a very minimal sand bed in my 225. Over the years when ive had tank crashes I always suspected the sand bed. With the flow I now have in my 225, I really which I had gone bare bottom.

 

[merlberg]

Inch and a half for me and i also have a bare bottom basically anything under 2 inches your going to have to clean the sand once a month, aragonite acts as a buffer , imo i used to used a deep sandbed but everyyear i hadda add more sand cause it melts away over time nd its litterally a ticking timebomb untill you disturbe it

So if its over 2 inches do you have to clean it more often or less?

 

[Eckolancer]

Same as you would with shallower or no sand. If you have over 5" never clean sand bed.

 

[JedClampett]

How about a coral covered sand bed

 

[maroun.c]

Mine started as a uniform 2.5 inch sand bed but now I can see areas with 4 inches and the glass in some spots... Waiting to have some more corals to stop the flow from shifting the sand!

 

[Stephanie11]

Here is a thought that I've never heard before.

Are you going for clean sps water or dirtier zoa water?

I run both Water perimeters in two tanks. My thoughts are if your water is super clean I enjoy the bare bottom look and all the arguments about bare bottom apply. I also run a dirty tank and bare bottom is not as visually stunning. I have a green tint on the bottom glass. I don't care because I'm going for growth for corals that thrive in dirtier conditions. In my dirty tank I got rid of a lot of sand because algae would just cover it.

Sand is relatively cheap so that shouldn't be a factor. Also how is the rock in your tank going to look? My thought is if you have just a wall of rock with no imput of placement I say go with sand. If when you setup your rock and you think it looks better if sand was there then put sand.

I always think bare bottom tanks with layers of coralline algae on the bottom look amazing. On the opposite approach I think certian open style aquascaped tanks look equally amazing with sand!