Rock - Sand or Glass?

[Guest clownfish4]

Just curious.

[Lee Stearns]

Just one caveat- If you are going to have diggers like the Watchman Goby and pistol shrimp team then you should put down some plain bathroom tile squares under your rocks so that they do not sink out of sight- Makes nice ledge caves for them to burrow under- otherwise the rock stack will shift from time to time as they never stop exploring under the rocks.

[ReefMon]

How I do it depends on the depth of the sand bed:

 

Shallow sand 0-3" on the tank bottom or on supports

 

Deep sand 3"+ in/on the sand

[GaryL]

my sand bed is about 4-5" in some places what i did was used limestone as base rock then put the sand in around that then put in the live rock. i sterilized the base rock 1st for a couple of days then rinsed well in DI H20. i got this idea from Aquariareview who has helped alot on the setup of my tank. HTH Gary

[michaelg]

I have always had the rock in the sand, though I don't put it on the glass and fill sand around it.  Anyone who has broken down a tank with rock like this can attest to the life that lives at the interface between rock and sand

[GaryL]

i agree with michael, i bought some live rock from reefotto when he broke his system down and you could tell what part of the rock that was in the sand, a super massive amount of tube worms. and probably more things than i can imagine. most of them survived the recycle process.

[Guest Rivah Rat]

I'm using Starboard. Too much flow for sand and I don't really like the look of glass.

[ReeferJones]

I just put it on the sand.