Deep Sand Beds still a thing?

[JOKER]

I have been running a remote DSB in my tank for 3 years. I just had a baffle for the skimmer section turn loose last week. I am in the process of getting a new sump setup now. I am researching how to go about replacing now, but I have struggled to keep nutrients detectable until I stopped doing water changes. I do small AWC daily of 2 gallons to keep trace elements up without dosing. My setup now has a DSB section on one side of sump, return in middle, and skimmer section on other end. I have a 12" sand bed in RDSB with some rock on top of it, nothing but return pump in middle, and marine pure blocks, and skimmer in skimmer portion. I run most of my water (about 75%) through skimmer section, the rest through RDSB. It has served me well especially since I stopped water changes. I actually dose 60 ml day of 2 part in the past few months it has really started to climb from growth. I have a cal RX on the way.

 

[eschaton]

Barring tearing down a tank, why would you ever want to stir or otherwise move around a deep sand bed? The whole purpose of them is to have sand at a depth great enough to support an anoxic area of your substrate, because the bacteria that convert nitrate into nitrogen gas operate best in anoxic conditions.

 

[JoshH]

I have been running a remote DSB in my tank for 3 years. I just had a baffle for the skimmer section turn loose last week. I am in the process of getting a new sump setup now. I am researching how to go about replacing now, but I have struggled to keep nutrients detectable until I stopped doing water changes. I do small AWC daily of 2 gallons to keep trace elements up without dosing. My setup now has a DSB section on one side of sump, return in middle, and skimmer section on other end. I have a 12" sand bed in RDSB with some rock on top of it, nothing but return pump in middle, and marine pure blocks, and skimmer in skimmer portion. I run most of my water (about 75%) through skimmer section, the rest through RDSB. It has served me well especially since I stopped water changes. I actually dose 60 ml day of 2 part in the past few months it has really started to climb from growth. I have a cal RX on the way.

Any particular reason you went 12" deep? Do you feel it's absolutely needed to work as a DSB? I was thinking of running one on my new setup in it's own section of the sump so I can take it offline if needed but I was only planning on running a 6-8" bed...

 

[Dr. Dendrostein]

Any particular reason you went 12" deep? Do you feel it's absolutely needed to work as a DSB? I was thinking of running one on my new setup in it's own section of the sump so I can take it offline if needed but I was only planning on running a 6-8" bed...

Anaerobic conditions start at approximately 2-3mm, if I was doing a DSB 4+ inches deep, I'd have a 1/4 inch tube in plenum and connect to dosing pump, so I pump some water controlled by ORP, more efficient.

 

[waywardreefer]

Anyone have thoughts on using sand to cover media like a Marinepure blocks? As in, place MP block(s) in a sump section then cover with a few inches of sand...creating a anaerobic/anoxic areas but also limiting the amount of area that could be disturbed/go boom? Like a hybrid DSB? Terrible idea?

 

[JOKER]

Any particular reason you went 12" deep? Do you feel it's absolutely needed to work as a DSB? I was thinking of running one on my new setup in it's own section of the sump so I can take it offline if needed but I was only planning on running a 6-8" bed...

I don't think it is necessary to go that deep, but I do think the deeper you can go the longer it may last. Mine doesn't have much cyano or anything showing in it. I will try to get a pic tomorrow. This is my first go with one, and i am so happy that i decided to go with it, but I also run skimmer, marine pure block, and an ATS part of the time. I have way too many hobbies, and the tank gets neglected a lot of the time. The sand in the DT needs a good cleaning now, but my nitrates are 10 or less, and phosphate was 0.02 with hanna last time I checked. I think I have checked twice in the last year. There are so many ways to run a reef tank. You just have to find what serves you best. I don't like doing a lot of WC with acros. The last tank I had that I tried ULNS never looked as good as the tank I have now. Coral need nutrients, nutrients cause algae, we do not want algae, so I just try and have the most nutrients available without algae going crazy. Check out my build thread, I posted a few videos a week or so ago.

 

[JoshH]

I don't think it is necessary to go that deep, but I do think the deeper you can go the longer it may last. Mine doesn't have much cyano or anything showing in it. I will try to get a pic tomorrow. This is my first go with one, and i am so happy that i decided to go with it, but I also run skimmer, marine pure block, and an ATS part of the time. I have way too many hobbies, and the tank gets neglected a lot of the time. The sand in the DT needs a good cleaning now, but my nitrates are 10 or less, and phosphate was 0.02 with hanna last time I checked. I think I have checked twice in the last year. There are so many ways to run a reef tank. You just have to find what serves you best. I don't like doing a lot of WC with acros. The last tank I had that I tried ULNS never looked as good as the tank I have now. Coral need nutrients, nutrients cause algae, we do not want algae, so I just try and have the most nutrients available without algae going crazy. Check out my build thread, I posted a few videos a week or so ago.

Do you run a plenum atall???

 

[JOKER]

Do you run a plenum atall???

I do not have a plenum. Just run water over the top of DSB.

 

[Roosterjack]

Never much cared for the bare bottom look. I don’t want to see my refugium light shining through it...

 

[User1]

Never much cared for the bare bottom look. I don’t want to see my refugium light shining through it...

Can always put put something underneed to prevent that.

 

[Feet4Fish]

Deep sand beds have use, but there are aspects to consider:

All this is based on using sand with grain size between 2-5mm....

The first 0.5 inches of sand has aerobic autotrophs that convert ammonia to nitrate ultimately.
The next 0.5 inches or so has facultative anaerobic heterotrophs that can reduce some of the nitrate in to gaseous nitrogen. The remaining depth is filled with obligate heterotrophs that reduce nitrate to ammonium, then back to nitrate, back to ammonium and so on. Some of the nitrate can leach back into the water column and this becomes more so if disturbed by sand sift critters. This is why sand sometimes get the term nutrient sink or cat litter box. This process stops at ammonium and gets stuck there because the bottom of the tank doesn't allow any further conversion.

 

[John08007]

Love this idea, what are everyone's thoughts on running a removable section of sump with a DSB essentially a remote DSB? Once it's a cause for concern it can be "Taken offline" and cleaned out without harming the rest of the system. Are they worth running


People use to use a 5 gal bucket, lid, 2 bulkheads to make a removable dsb

 

[sarcophytonIndy]

There are so many other ways to export nutrients. DSB is just a waste of tank volume, and like others have mentioned, can turn into a hydrogen sulfide bomb.

 

[Daniel@R2R]

If I were to use a DSB, it would definitely be a remote DSB. I can imagine using a 5 gallon bucket and plumbing it in via a manifold.

 

[Thales]

I have been running a remote deep sand bed for 15 years. I took it off line once for a year or so, then put it back online with some new sand. I don't think it is big enough for my system (approx 400 gallons total, the RDSB is a 20 gallon tank), but I run it because it is easy. Maybe I will make a bigger one.
I think in tank DSB's aren't for me because I don't want a sand bed display, and would rather have more of the animals I want to look at. YMMV.

I think the idea of a DSB being a ticking time bomb and having a lifespan is largely over stated because of correlations rather than causation. YMMV

 

[Thales]

Never much cared for the bare bottom look. I don’t want to see my refugium light shining through it...

Search for faux sand bed.

 

[boacvh]

Anyone have thoughts on using sand to cover media like a Marinepure blocks? As in, place MP block(s) in a sump section then cover with a few inches of sand...creating a anaerobic/anoxic areas but also limiting the amount of area that could be disturbed/go boom? Like a hybrid DSB? Terrible idea?

I am currently running this in a section of my sump. More by noobie mistake than anything else. I had a large Marine block in a small section of my eshopps sump and to prevent it from wiggling back and forth I filled the sides with sand. Then I started reading about the dsb issues and so decided not to disturb it, but afraid I might have a ticking bomb?. It's been running a year+ like that with chaeto in same chamber. Not sure if I am getting the benefits of a dsb but haven't had any issues so far. Worst case scenario I can turn of flow and remove all water and sand in that section without it going into system. Also curious to know what people think

 

[russthefishguy111]

I prefer the look of deep sand beds and once everything is stable and with solid CUC it stays looking nice

 

[Thales]

Anyone have thoughts on using sand to cover media like a Marinepure blocks? As in, place MP block(s) in a sump section then cover with a few inches of sand...creating a anaerobic/anoxic areas but also limiting the amount of area that could be disturbed/go boom? Like a hybrid DSB? Terrible idea?

I don't think that is helpful - the anerobic activity is already inside the block already so you are losing the aerobic activity on the surface. Like putting live rock under the sand. Not a terrble thing, just not really helpful. YMMV

 

[Thales]

I am currently running this in a section of my sump. More by noobie mistake than anything else. I had a large Marine block in a small section of my eshopps sump and to prevent it from wiggling back and forth I filled the sides with sand. Then I started reading about the dsb issues and so decided not to disturb it, but afraid I might have a ticking bomb?. It's been running a year+ like that with chaeto in same chamber. Not sure if I am getting the benefits of a dsb but haven't had any issues so far. Worst case scenario I can turn of flow and remove all water and sand in that section without it going into system. Also curious to know what people think

I think the time bomb stuff is over stated. But yeah, if you can isolate when removing anerobic stuff, you should.