how often should sand bed be changed.

[Esquire805]

99.99% of problems people have on this forum are related to them trying to make their tanks pristine. It’s not the ocean and odds are never will be as far as success goes no matter how hard you try. Do we think the sand on the ocean floor is pristine? Lol, no. It’s the ultimate DSB and it’s full of detritus. Don’t do too many things people. Siphoning the sand a little every now and then is plenty.

I think the ocean can filter things out better than our tanks. there are many life forms to keep everything balanced, we dont have that. so i think some type of maintenance should be done, but not super clean.

 

[Proteus Meep]

I think the ocean can filter things out better than our tanks. there are many life forms to keep everything balanced, we dont have that. so i think some type of maintenance should be done, but not super clean.

Agreed even the planet itself takes away the dead decaying organic matter that collects really deep in the sand through the bedrock below to form...oil

As our tanks have glass below it just sits there unless we intervene, if the ocean had lifeforms that processed it down to a completely inert state, and they would certainly do this faster than geological processes take it away there would be no oil, so there will always be a build up in our reefs greater than that of the ocean that requires us to remove it as even the ocean with its vast variety of life still requires geological processing to remove it...it would just be a stagnant lifeless mess if it didnt

Our tanks are nothing like the ocean and its vast diversity of life..almost desert like in comparison and definitely require human intervention in the form of export...a regular sand vacuum of course being a perfectly viable export option if all the sand is done and not just the surface layer which is often all many DSB gets

That's one of the reasons i vacuum weekly and change sand quarterly.... to make up the shortfall bedrock style

Its a lack of action that more often than not ends in disaster rather than action

 

[Esquire805]

Agreed even the planet itself takes away the dead decaying organic matter that collects really deep in the sand through the bedrock below to form...oil

As our tanks have glass below it just sits there unless we intervene, if the ocean had lifeforms that processed it down to a completely inert state, and they would certainly do this faster than geological processes take it away there would be no oil, so there will always be a build up in our reefs greater than that of the ocean that requires us to remove it as even the ocean with its vast variety of life still requires geological processing to remove it...it would just be a stagnant lifeless mess if it didnt

Our tanks are nothing like the ocean and its vast diversity of life..almost desert like in comparison and definitely require human intervention in the form of export...a regular sand vacuum of course being a perfectly viable export option if all the sand is done and not just the surface layer which is often all many DSB gets

That's one of the reasons i vacuum weekly and change sand quarterly.... to make up the shortfall bedrock style

Its a lack of action that more often than not ends in disaster rather than action

Good observations, i wil continue with my methods.

 

[Nano sapiens]

The whole DSB thing was supposed to work by having the sand full of worms and such to keep it friable and slowly turned over. Deep vacuuming a DSB was considered taboo since the critters would have been removed. In practice, few many pulled this off effectively, so ultimately the bed became a detritus sink.

Any sand bed has the potential to live on indefinitely, but does need some maintenance. In a small nano, that ends up primarily being the reef keeper either blowing the detritus out of the sand/rocks to be collected in a sock or floss and/or vacuuming the bed. How often this needs to be done depends on numerous factors such as biomass, amount fed, etc. In large systems, a good compliment of sand sifting organisms can assist with this process, sometimes to the point where the aquarist doesn't need to touch it all for many years.

This is a 12 year old 12g nano, but 80% of the sand bed is from an earlier 55g and is 20 years old:

 

[brandon429]

Your tank gets more pristine and clear and healthy every five years dang thats nice

 

[Nano sapiens]

Your tank gets more pristine and clear and healthy every five years dang thats nice

Thanks. What's interesting is that even without any mechanical or chemical media, the aquarium water becomes crystal clear in about two to three hours after vacuuming/stirring up the system. There is a lot of periphyton on the live rock that acts like sticky fly paper that effectively captures particles (I can feel the biofilm when I occasionally have to handle the rocks), as well as a good variety of hungry mouths

Switched to a bioturbination method (fancy term for using a turkey baster to forcibly blast water under the base rock work to dislodge built up detritus) instead of my usual occasional removal of base live rock to vacuum up detritus. After doing this twice in a month's time, I actually had to stop the process as it was too efficient (dropped PO4 and NO3 from a steady 0.02 ppm/4 ppm (respectively) to 'undectable' levels with no other system changes). Planning to use this blast process just once every few months as I did with the base rock removal.

 

[Ef4life]

Thanks. What's interesting is that even without any mechanical or chemical media, the aquarium water becomes crystal clear in about two to three hours after vacuuming/stirring up the system. There is a lot of periphyton on the live rock that acts like sticky fly paper that effectively captures particles (I can feel the biofilm when I occasionally have to handle the rocks).

Switched to a bioturbination method (fancy term for using a turkey baster to forcibly blast water under the base rock work to dislodge built up detritus) instead of my usual occasional removal of base live rock to vacuum up detritus. After doing this twice in a month's time, I actually had to stop the process as it was too efficient (dropped PO4 and NO3 from a steady 0.02 ppm/4 ppm (respectively) to 'undectable' levels with no other system changes). Planning to use this blast process just once every few months as I did with the base rock removal.

I had to stop turkey basting the rocks in my biocube 29, it got too clean as well. Now I just do a waterchange and sand vacuuming every 2 weeks. The tank will be 7 years old June 1st. I’ve never changed the sand, just added more over the years to replace what was sucked out.

 

[Nano sapiens]

I had to stop turkey basting the rocks in my biocube 29, it got too clean as well. Now I just do a waterchange and sand vacuuming every 2 weeks. The tank will be 7 years old June 1st. I’ve never changed the sand, just added more over the years to replace what was sucked out.

I've found there's a somewhat narrow balance between 'too clean' and 'too dirty'. Identifying, and staying in between the two, is understandably difficult for novice reef keepers.

 

[brandon429]

Im glad to know you guys were measuring nutrients pre and post rip clean, good to know they're that effective for the tanks we do want to undo/nutrient sink eject etc.

One thing Im finding as a pattern in the sand rinse thread where we just 100% blast rinse all of them, no matter the presentation, is that though we hammer nutrients in this way via physical export of nutrient stores/particulate organic matter/ its not causing tradeoff invasion like will occur if we leave waste in place then strip nitrate or phosphate with targeting media.

that form of nutrient control is fraught with bleaching, dinos, tradeoff invasions and we specifically do not have that data in the sr thread/handy compare

I can fully understand how someone would want to keep N and P flux in control/modulate the depth and frequency of physical cleaning vs just drop it as low as possible in one swoop. people gravitate towards stability vs suppressing competition microbes/starving them of N and P.

We're still forced to totally clean sand though in home transfer jobs/too many recycle risks for leaving any of the waste. To offset that insult, we ramp up lighting in the new tank/no full production after organics robbing. if someone does want to deep clean or replace sand, just be thorough and dont leave any waste and the whole thing will mix and match with a current reef setup just perfectly.

 

[Nano sapiens]

Im glad to know you guys were measuring nutrients pre and post rip clean, good to know they're that effective for the tanks we do want to undo/nutrient sink eject etc.

The bioturbidation experiment was an eye-opener as to how effective it was. I should mention that while I was blasting away under the rock, I had put a sock on my return outlet and let that filter the water for ~ 1/2 hour. My reef aquarium was already fairly clean, so if anyone with base rock that hasn't been disturbed for a good long while goes gung-ho and blasts away, just be forewarned that too much old waste allowed to circulate around the system can cause serious issues!

I can fully understand how someone would want to keep N and P flux in control/modulate the depth and frequency of physical cleaning vs just drop it as low as possible in one swoop. people gravitate towards stability vs storm thats for sure.

By removing detritus/uneated food/other metabolites, we are in effect controlling the potential source instead of trying to deal with an end result (build up of PO4, NO3 and other substances). The act of vacuuming or blasting also makes the sand more friable which benefits the resident bacteria. If I had a really large system with base rock that couldn't be removed, I'd still prefer to occasionally use a strong pump with a tube attached to dislodge at least some of the material for removal.

 

[Ef4life]

Im glad to know you guys were measuring nutrients pre and post rip clean, good to know they're that effective for the tanks we do want to undo/nutrient sink eject etc.

One thing Im finding as a pattern in the sand rinse thread where we just 100% blast rinse all of them, no matter the presentation, is that though we hammer nutrients in this way via physical export of nutrient stores/particulate organic matter/ its not causing tradeoff invasion like will occur if we leave waste in place then strip nitrate or phosphate with targeting media.

that form of nutrient control is fraught with bleaching, dinos, tradeoff invasions and we specifically do not have that data in the sr thread/handy compare

I can fully understand how someone would want to keep N and P flux in control/modulate the depth and frequency of physical cleaning vs just drop it as low as possible in one swoop. people gravitate towards stability vs suppressing competition microbes/starving them of N and P.

We're still forced to totally clean sand though in home transfer jobs/too many recycle risks for leaving any of the waste. To offset that insult, we ramp up lighting in the new tank/no full production after organics robbing. if someone does want to deep clean or replace sand, just be thorough and dont leave any waste and the whole thing will mix and match with a current reef setup just perfectly.

For the record I never test my biocube, but it’s been around long enough I know how it reacts. When I was in the too clean phase I was blasting the rocks and blasting the sand with the turkey badger at least 2x a week, filter floss change about an hour after blasting. then a weekly 5g wc while siphoning the sandbed. During that time chaeto just flat out stopped growing then started dying back. That’s when I know it was too far, I totally stopped using the turkey blaster now except for once every few months when I do a deep clean. It took a long time for it to get back close to normal chaeto growth/harvesting.