in that thread we removed ten year beds.
this isn't just challenge for challenge sake though, these people were mostly moving homes, we were forced to find a way to break that rule of disturbance.
the good part is 100% over 5 years, this is some of the tightest stats one can get in reefing. it all stems from noticing a common fallacy in the hobby (yes, there are more fallacies beyond stuck cycles)
that removing surface area must be done in portions to allow buildup on other surfaces, ie bac move from one location to another.
That doesn't occur in reefing, ever, so we were able to break the rules if a certain order of ops is in play, click the thread to see examples.
when one removes a sandbed instantly, the bac do not grow or become more dense on remaining surfaces, that's the fallacy at play.
the other surfaces are either enough surface area to run the reef bioload alone, or they're not, and the whole system dies in ten hours.
there is no in between cycle, ever, and there is no mini cycle in reefing.
at no time in reefing has any tank had a stuck reading of .5 true ammonia or .25 true ammonia, all of them are false reads, no seneye users report ammonia in the tenths, ever. = we have a new cycle ref in town and its seneye.
while its true that removing sandbeds not using the known safe order of ops can have lasting harm, using the safe order of ops clearly isn't harmful, even for aged beds, its in the link.
*what does happen to the remaining bac?
like any hydrated bacterial colonies, their life / death cycles continue in relation to their vital space...the rock left. water shear/tank current controls how tall bac can stack on a given surface, those rocks have been regulating the amounts of bac they carry since you put them in, they don't stop doing that just because sand is given, or taken.
interspecies pressure also regulates bacteria colonies we can see. if you aren't dosing carbon, reef bac tend to balance themselves just fine. forever.
if you remove one set of wheels from a dually pickup, leaving only 4, it still drives.
100% of the bad stuff you see involved in sandbed removals is the detritus not being teased out correctly, and, after a bed exchange you re ramp up the lights.
you will bleach out more systems if you put the new reef back under full lighting instantly.
