Clean Sand Bed On Pico

[raul lopez]

I have a 4 gallon pico and am always stirring around the sand due to the reason that I don’t want algae build up, what is some live stock I could add to stir it up for me that won’t parish over time do to an insufficient food source. The reason I say this is because wouldn’t a sand sifting goby be too large and outcompete the the algae growth?I currently have a nassarius snail but it spends most of its time under the sand bed. any ideas?

[Tamberav]

Sand sifting goby would definitely not fit. I have to feed mine a lot in an 80g. Their bioload alone would just create algae.

 

A tiger pistol shrimp will move it around a good amount. That would probably be my choice.

 

For the most part... sand bed maintenance is our job. 

[Grimes]

I spend less that 2 minutes every morning on my 15 gal running a bamboo stick through the sandbed, weekly give it a good old vac to pull out the crap. It's brilliant white all of the time. Better than any animal or chemical. 

[Tired]

Cerith snails will stir a little bit. Nassarius don't move in the sandbed, as you've seen- they just lurk and wait for food. Ceriths will push it around a little. 

 

Manual stirring is good.