Poll: Refugium - Sand or bare bottom?
- Thread starter NinnJinn
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Mine is bare bottom with some live rock.
Coral Hygiene
Active Member
I have a bare bottom with just chaeto bc; its a lot easier to clean
Susan Edwards
5000 Club Member
I have sand as the sand I was taking out of a 37 gal had lots of pods so some of the sand went to the coral qt and some to the refugium along with all the live rock
vio
Active Member
Very few ppl. may have PO4 test for organic waste, depend 110% how easy or if you can to siphon the sand , sand is NICE but, need to be siphon , in my opinion , Detritus is # 1 enemy for reef tanks , now , depend how fast , you try to removed, if you can, most of the time is pain. That way same ppl. prefer high flow and Tonga Rocks in display and B.B. next to refugium.
Brew12
Electrical Gru
I use this.
https://www.bulkreefsupply.com/fiji-mud-refugium-starter-walt-smith.html
I have a layer between 2" and 3" thick and my chaeto floats above it so I can flip the chaeto without stirring it up too much. I'm a big fan of the stuff.
In my mind, there are 3 great products to add biodiversity to a system.
Garf Grunge: great for biodiversity, especially the larger stuff like amphipods and bristleworms. Doesn't do much for trace elements.
Miracle Mud: Doesn't do much for biodiversity directly but is "clean" and great for trace elements.
Fiji Mud: Fits between the other two. Good for trace elements, but not as good as MM. Adds biodiversity at the algae and bacteria levels but unlikely to add much of the larger stuff like GG. It is the most natural of the products. It is literally unprocessed mud scooped up from a big mud flat off the coast of Fiji. The downside of that? I have found a bottlecap in mine and other garbage is a possibility.
cracker
5000 Club Member
Thanks ! Does it need to be removed & replaced after a time? I ask because ref sandbeds Iv'e had in the past end up getting funky.
Back to the subject, I did use sandbeds but moved away to bare with chaeto just easier to clean .
Back to the subject, I did use sandbeds but moved away to bare with chaeto just easier to clean .
Brew12
Electrical Gru
It doesn't need to be removed imo. I do stir it up and release more into the water around once a week. Eventually I'm sure I will need to add more but that will be a long time from now.
C-Reefer
Well-Known Member
bare bottom with live rock rubble. I have an HOB fuge and I have it half full of seachem matrix and half full of chaeto. Works great, I have to keep it on a timer or nitrates are 0 in no time.
Last edited:
I got my rubble from KB Reefs. It's perfect, uniform size, and the cheapest rubble I could find. (Excuse the algae turf scrubber messing up the shot; building it's box today)
https://www.kb-reefs.com/products/rufugium-reef-rubble
Stacked higher on the left to catch more flow and incoming bubbles...
https://www.kb-reefs.com/products/rufugium-reef-rubble
Stacked higher on the left to catch more flow and incoming bubbles...
I have a deep sand bed in my fuge.
IMO , if you are going to use sand
Go deep.
http://www.ronshimek.com/deep_sand_beds.html
I used fiji mud along with the sands.
Ron and others suggest that using much smaller grains mixed some larger ones will allow for better water circulation in the sand bed and avoid the possibility of areas going dangerously anerobic. He does call this making mud.
Miracle Mud From the ecosystems method uses a similar technique but they use a silicate sand rather than aragonite or oolite ,play sand , for the same reason. Avoiding compaction and adding surface area for bacteria.
Worthy of note, a deep sand bed needs bugs for water flow and stirring. Primarily worms , but also amphipods and isopods.
Sadly , I’m by DTs DSB, my snapping ghost shrimp of three years passed away recently. I only really saw it once in a tunnel at the front of the glass.
IMO , if you are going to use sand
Go deep.
http://www.ronshimek.com/deep_sand_beds.html
I used fiji mud along with the sands.
Ron and others suggest that using much smaller grains mixed some larger ones will allow for better water circulation in the sand bed and avoid the possibility of areas going dangerously anerobic. He does call this making mud.
Miracle Mud From the ecosystems method uses a similar technique but they use a silicate sand rather than aragonite or oolite ,play sand , for the same reason. Avoiding compaction and adding surface area for bacteria.
Worthy of note, a deep sand bed needs bugs for water flow and stirring. Primarily worms , but also amphipods and isopods.
Sadly , I’m by DTs DSB, my snapping ghost shrimp of three years passed away recently. I only really saw it once in a tunnel at the front of the glass.
Who doesn’t love the beach?Would I be wrong to say I prefer a sandy bare bottom?
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