Ok so I had a job interview the other day at a local fish store and they only do saltwater tanks they did like my enthusiasm and love for fish and I may get hired on around the end of July. They want me to set up a small saltwater tank tho so I can at least get a feel for them and etc. Well I wanna set one up real quick to marrow while a lfs near me is still having a sale on live rock $3 a pound, I have the tank heater and a 30gallon filter that I figure should provide enough flow and filtration for now until I can save up from a couple pay checks to buy a skimmer and a power head or 2. My biggest question is about sand, Will I be fine with just live rock and obviously saltwater to start, or should I buy sand tomorrow and just get a smaller amount of salt? I only have roughly 60 this pay day to work with and then next Thursday well see what I have to work with then. I do know I eventually want a deep sand bed but that will be a couple pay check away project.
10gal quick start up
- Thread starter Zari
- Start date
Here are the reasons that I do not like in tank DSB.
One...to make a dsb work, you need to have a relatively undisturbed sand bed, and it needs to be deep. Your tank is a relatively small space, that has a lot of nutrients being added constantly. Water changes and filtration only remove nutrients that are in suspension in the water column.
Sooner or later, you will have a build up of waste in your DSB. (This will happen even if you have detritivores in your sand bed...they poop, and die, leaving more waste in the sand bed)
This stuff will stay there, and rot, because you can disturb the sand bed, and mess up the specific environment the bacterial colonies need to process nitrogenous wastes.
Sooner later, every one of the tanks I have seen set up this way run into nitrogen issues. Then the hair algae and everything else that comes along with it.
If you want the effect of a DSB, make yourself a denitrification tower. Zero risk of build up (if you properly filter the water coming in) and 100x more efficient than trying to do the same thing in 4-6 inches of sand. All that is is wasted tank space IMO.
One...to make a dsb work, you need to have a relatively undisturbed sand bed, and it needs to be deep. Your tank is a relatively small space, that has a lot of nutrients being added constantly. Water changes and filtration only remove nutrients that are in suspension in the water column.
Sooner or later, you will have a build up of waste in your DSB. (This will happen even if you have detritivores in your sand bed...they poop, and die, leaving more waste in the sand bed)
This stuff will stay there, and rot, because you can disturb the sand bed, and mess up the specific environment the bacterial colonies need to process nitrogenous wastes.
Sooner later, every one of the tanks I have seen set up this way run into nitrogen issues. Then the hair algae and everything else that comes along with it.
If you want the effect of a DSB, make yourself a denitrification tower. Zero risk of build up (if you properly filter the water coming in) and 100x more efficient than trying to do the same thing in 4-6 inches of sand. All that is is wasted tank space IMO.
I would put a layer of sand at the bottom, but as Flesh says no DSB... i would do rock and sand then let it sit.
on a 10g tank filtration/skimmers aren't really needed, just be consistent with water changes
on a 10g tank filtration/skimmers aren't really needed, just be consistent with water changes
surely you should know this if you are about to work in a marine shop? to serve a customer u need to know more then the basics??
Well he hasn't been hired yet....
However if you are gonna work in a shop like that you'll need to learn the ends and out of skimmers, lighting, powerhead, refugiums, algal mats, calcium reactors, uv sterilizers, and so so much more. Have fun but get started soon!