Sand or No Sand..What’s best?

[bcopenhaver]

I’m setting up a 120G soon. What are the Pros and Cons to a “Non Sand bed”? Thanks.

 

 

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[YHSublime]

Honestly, it’s what YOU want. I find sand to be mostly an aesthetic choice, however, some fish and inserts require it. It also allows for more surface area for beneficial bacteria.

Personally, I’m more of a bare bottom style reefer. I like seeing where detritus settles, and low flow areas in the tank. Makes it super easy to clean.

[treesprite]

I didn't like doing bare bottom, but keep the sand bed less than 2". One thing it does is reflect light to the underside of corals. I've heard of people painting the underside of the tank to give the the illusion of sand.

[sethsolomon]

Pros of no sand:

• you can have higher flow
• easier to clean
• you can grow corals on the bottom glass

Cons:

• Cant have sand burrowing fish and inverts (No wrases, no watchman gobies, no sand sifting starfish, no nassarius snails, no conch)
• don't get the aesthetics of sand on the bottom 

Edited January 30, 2020 by sethsolomon

[menglish]

have you ever been to the beech, snorkeling or diving and never seen any sand?

-sand is natural

-more biodiversity

-keep wrasses (I have 7 in my tank)

[newbie2014]

I personally chose no sand for a 2 reasons. 1. Sand is for my livestocks, and none of them cares or needs it. 2. Easier detritus control which can lead to easy maintenance and better water quality. BRSTV also confirmed that while sand bottom allow faster cycle and stabilization, long term upkeep is much more tedious (and unpredictable?) compared to no sand; which gets better over time. 

[BtmDweller]

I think it is more of a challenge with sand. You need to really watch your feedings. Food particles can get caught and then buried. If you’re really good at keeping lower nutrient water and have no algae growing in your tank then it will look nice and still needs something to stir/clean. If not it will become covered with algae and looks ugly. A lot of people are doing no sand because its easier to blow if the detritus.


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[lynn.reef.nerd]

I tried both sand and bare bottom. I noticed that it takes a lot longer to stabilize a tank with no sand. It was also harder to keep sps happy at the beginning with no sand. I love wrasses so I prefer sand anyways. It's really down to preference (aesthetic, fish stocking, etc.).

[davelin315]

It is personal preference but I think oolitic sand is best but it takes a lot longer to get set up and “seasoned” but the end results are great.  Once it is properly coated with biofilm I feel that it can handle tons of flow, stays clean, and is great for all kinds of life in addition to not getting dirty because it turns over so easily in high flow tanks.

[DFR]

Everyone already mentioned the major pros and cons, but one additional reason I’ve opted against bare bottom is keeping it clean.  It is easy to remove detritus but harder to clean algae.

 I don’t like to get my hands and arms wet so I’m able to use a magnetic cleaner to clean film algae off the glass walls before it gets to that stubborn hard to remove stage where a razor is needed. Similarly, with bare bottom, since the film probably won’t get cleaned as frequently, there’ll likely always have be a coat of algae on the surface.

[madweazl]

I like wrasse, gobies, pistol shrimp, conch, cucumbers etc. way too much to keep a bare bottom tank. I think the fear of detritus is way over blown; I have a good 3/4" layer of it in the bottom of my sump and have no issues with nutrients. I vacuum the sand once or twice a year. 

[bcopenhaver]

I went with sand...thank you to all who sent their intel on the topic. I appreciate it.
Mods..please close. Thanks.


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[YHSublime]

We don’t lock up outside of sale threads that have completed.

[treesprite]

17 hours ago, bcopenhaver said:

I went with sand...thank you to all who sent their intel on the topic. I appreciate it.
Mods..please close. Thanks.


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What kind of sand and how deep?

[jason the filter freak]

It's really user preference and how "lazy" you are re: feeding and keeping a sand bed clean. 

 

I can say with 98.67% confidence I will never have a tank without a sand bed. I prefer a more natural look and sincerely enjoy watching the tiny little life that springs up in sand beds and digging/sand sifting fish.