First Nano, need advice

[Squirrel_reefer]

Good morning reefers,

I have a 10g tank just laying around and a HOB, heater, and a light. I was thinking about using this as a small growout tank for frags. If I forego fish, would it be possible to rely on the live sand as the sole biological filtration? I have some bioballs in my current 20g reef tank that I could stick in the HOB but I was wanting to reserve that for chemi-pure and Carbon.

Maybe it would be better to set the tank up as a reef with live rock and use a frag rack?

 

[Tahoe61]

The medium used in the the HOB, foam, floss, sponge also become part of the biological filter after a couple weeks, just rinse it in SW to clean to preserve the bacteria.
You could throw some rubble in the HOB or use bio-balls.
It's not uncommon to have a frag tank without a scape of LR, I see no issue.