Deep Sand Bed

[dling]

How many of you still use a DSB in your sump ?

[Murphs_Reef]

Just floss at the moment

[Micro-Reefs Aquariums]

I have a 3 inch sand bed in my tank, does that count?

[Micro-Reefs Aquariums]

Here is how the sand bed looks in my 12 gallon cube 

 

 

[dferrari13]

Very nice....All three of my nano reef tanks have a deep sand bed. 5.5 gallon, 10 gallon, and 37 gallon

[dling]

I had one in my sump for years 8x10 area the sand bed was 8" deep. Ive since removed it in lieu of two lg bio cubes. Im starting to wonder if I made a mistake. My tank has not been the same since.

[Micro-Reefs Aquariums]

51 minutes ago, dling said:

I had one in my sump for years 8x10 area the sand bed was 8" deep. Ive since removed it in lieu of two lg bio cubes. Im starting to wonder if I made a mistake. My tank has not been the same since.

The deep sand bed was old school reefing to capture anaerobic bacteria to break down nitrates.  It had to be really thick to work, some even suggesting using a large trash bin, full of sand I remember reading with water trickling over it and then back into the display.

 

Since coming back everyone is into algae scrubbers and growing a good amount of cheato to export nutrients.

 

I have a rather thick layer of sand in the display but it is only for looks and I doubt it does anything to bring down the nitrates.  I vacuum it up when I do water changes so I figure it's breaking up the beneficial bacteria as I disturb it when I clean.

 

So, I got the cheato instead in my AIO area, which I am pushing the limits of the tank with all these add on options.  

 

[Subsea]

I ran my 75G display tank with a Jaubert Plenum and 4” DSB for 20 years.  On bottom was a 30G EcoSystem mud/macro refugium.  I had relied on detrivores in dsb to handle  sandbed maintenance.  However with introduction of Melanarious Wrasse, over a 2 yr period, sandbed janitors were eliminated.  Five yrs ago, I vacuumed out 200lbs of substrate and hundreds of gallons of water.   Sandbed depth was decreased to less than 2”.  The biggest change was to pump oxygen rich water into the void of the plenum and up true the substrate as a reverse flow ug filter.
 

As this tank has matured, nutrient export of nitrate is not required, in fact I add ammonia daily.  One other thing on denitrification  requiring dsb, in Reef Aquarium, Volume 3 both nitrification & denitrification bacteria lived “close coupled” to each other.