Want to hear from anyone using a DSB in their DT, also miracle mud for sump

[subsea]

Tim, what do you have against snails. I like mine with garlic. Patrick

[Timfish]

. . . I prefer both to snails. . .

Not to derail the thread, but I'm curious why you don't like snails?

Over the years I've seen lots and lots of empty shells and very few live ones. I guess I should also point out I do not like a bunch of hermits either but I usually will start off a tank with one or two dozen sml blue leg hermits.

[Timfish]

Tim, what do you have against snails. I like mine with garlic. Patrick

You know I guess I was too broad in my statement and should have done a better job of qualifying it. I also like mine with garlic and some butter as well

[subsea]

This is my 75 gallon display tank with a 30 gallon mud refugium. The refugium is 30" long with three compartments. The first compartment is 4". It has bio-balls to promote gas exchange and to break up detritus to be assimilated into the mud bed. The mud bed spans 20" of the 30" refugium. Any macro will work as the vegatable componant of this mud filter. I do not feel that mud is required. Any substrate that is .1mm-1mm will support the multitude of micro inverts. Many ditrivore will reproduce prolificly in this organic soup. Multiple nutriant pathways with biodiversity at the bottom of the food chain provides stability to the health of our reef systems. Because I harvest ediable seaweed, Red Ogo, I maximize light intensity with five 24W PC bulbs in the mud and vegetable filter and harvest regularly.

[subsea]

Other thoughts on the cuc link you provided he suggest staying away from hermits but it's pretty much everywhere that people think these guys are good? What are your thoughts? Is it a DBS thing? I was never thinking of going with the 50 or so that some sites recommend for my size tank but my 5 or 10? Also the nessarius snail http://www.bluezooaq...pid=1140&cid=82 I have one of these in my nano and the guy is awesome and eating left over food from feeding is one really that bad? My youngest daughter is fascinated with this and call him snowy because it looks like snow when he plows out from the sand at feeding time LOL. Last one ummm I really want a urchin what are your thoughts on this?

Again thanks for all the advice and tips and links to good research!

I like Nassarius Snails for many reasons. IMO, their best attribute is reproducing in our DSB. Patrick

[gibs]

Well I have decided to eventually setup a mud bed in my refugium. I am running a 1.5 inch sand bed in my DT and have a plan to add a remote DSB refugium/dt at some point in the future. I am doing some more research myself in to the mud versus a fine sugar sand as Patrick mentioned. I am not seeing any reason not to at the moment so I don't see why it wouldn't work. This tank has taken up the past month and half of my life and destroyed my apartment so I am going to be trying to get it up and cycled for the next few weeks/months and spend a little more time with my kiddos than I have lol. I want to thank everyone for all the thoughts and advice, I have bookmarked almost every research link you guys have posted and read them and going back and rereading them LOL. Going to start off my CUC with 12 star astrea 1 turbo 1 nessarius and a few hermits still undecided on number.

[reefreak]

a friend of mines tank just a 1ft sand bed for filtration no sump no skimmer just sand and rock.

http://www.maast.org/showthread.php?65792-250-gallon-solar-reef&highlight=hobogato

[Bpb]

Coolest part about that tank to me is that he uses solar tubes. Would love to get solar tubes one day

[subsea]

Well I have decided to eventually setup a mud bed in my refugium. I am running a 1.5 inch sand bed in my DT and have a plan to add a remote DSB refugium/dt at some point in the future. I am doing some more research myself in to the mud versus a fine sugar sand as Patrick mentioned. I am not seeing any reason not to at the moment so I don't see why it wouldn't work. This tank has taken up the past month and half of my life and destroyed my apartment so I am going to be trying to get it up and cycled for the next few weeks/months and spend a little more time with my kiddos than I have lol. I want to thank everyone for all the thoughts and advice, I have bookmarked almost every research link you guys have posted and read them and going back and rereading them LOL. Going to start off my CUC with 12 star astrea 1 turbo 1 nessarius and a few hermits still undecided on number.

I like to use Doctor Ron Shimek at this time

http://www.ronshimek..._sand_beds.html

This article is a tremendous resource, if you are interested in some practical advice and information from a world class scientist and reef aquarium hobiest for 30 years.

Do not get hung up on the word "mud". Engineers and scientist use grain size from boulder to fine clays (30cm - .0001mm). If you read the article, he gives a range which includes ollite or sugar sands.

Enjoy this part of the hobby. I consider it going to the next level.

Patrick

[reefreak]

Coolest part about that tank to me is that he uses solar tubes. Would love to get solar tubes one day

yeah he actually has a 2 story house and runs them through his closet.

[+KimP]

Is there a minimum size for a dsb to be beneficial? A remote one.

[reefreak]

Well if you were going to do one i think its a 4in minimum and when doing so burry your base pieces into the sand instead of setting them on it.

[+KimP]

I was wondering about the area, not so much the depth. That's good info though too, so thanks!

[Timfish]

Dr. Juabert's research the DSB was in the DT and there's specific notes rock did not cover more than 30% of the sand. The mud system I have the square footage of the mud bed is about 2/5s the square footage of the DT. Some people may argue a mud bed 5" deep is not the same as a sand bed, it's one of those things I haven't bothered to look up the arguments for or against.

[bige]

Im curious, in the article it seems it's mixed. Sand and mud. Did I read it wrong? Or should there be mud then sand?

[Scutterborn]

From the reading I've done on effective DSB's, the depth should be 4-6". The depth of the beds effectiveness is determined by the granule size. Too coarse and the critters will be unable to scavenge through it due to the weight of the sand. The finer the substrate, the easier it will be to burrow through. Mud is very, very fine. Even compared to oolite sand. You may be able to go a bit deeper with mud. If you go too deep the sand will begin to calcify together, thus becoming inefficient for a DSB. I just picked up the reef aquarium Vol 3 by Delbeek and Sprung. I will be cracking that bad boy open tonight and I'm looking forward to increasing my knowledge base on various forms adopted by different theories.

Ps. Thanks for the heads up, Tim!

- Ben -

Edited August 22, 2012 by Scutterborn

[Scutterborn]

Here's a good link I found and have read several times over.

http://www.reef-eden.net/DSBs.htm

- Ben -

[Timfish]

Thought I'd post this picture of how NOT to set up a DSB. This was pulled out of a tank a Jaubert DSB was used in conjuction with a calcium reactor run with very strong CO2 flow for a very long time. The result was literally a solid mass that had to be jack hammered out. (Friend of a friend had to do move a tank and gave me a piece, I think I would have passed on the job.) A calcium ractor can be used if desired but it needs to be monitored. In addition to Reefreak's link of a system just using a DSB, Dr. Jaubert was maintaining multple reef systems for years using just airbubbles for circulation (no pumps) and no water changes.

It was interesting and informative reading the artcle by S. Garret on Reef-Eden although he did not appear to be aware of Dr. Juabert's research done at the Nice Aquarium in the 80's. I also found it curious was Dr. Shemik also did not mentioned Dr. Jauberts research. For a different view of how to set up a Deep Sand Bed see Delbeck and Sprungs "The Reef Aquarium" Vol III or see this article by Julian Sprung: http://www.advancedaquarist.com/2002/9/aafeature

Two notable differences between Dr. Shemik and Dr. Jaubert is grain size and use of a plenum. While Dr. Shemik want's partcles smaller than .2 mm Dr. Jaubert uses grain sizes as large as 5 mm. Dr. Jaubert uses a plenum underneath the sand bed and while Dr. Shemick states it is not neccessary Julian Sprung catagoricly states a sand bed will operate better with a plenum.

[bige]

Can you elaborate on plenum?

[subsea]

A plenum is a false bottom that maintains a void space underneath the dsb, less than 1". I use eggcrate with nylon screen material. I normally scatter short pieces of 1/2" PVC on bottom glass to maintain void.

The large grain size is required to promote an extended oxygen gradiant in the "faculative zone". Due to this large grain size, the low level oxygen zone is extended thru a larger volumn of sand bed. In the oxygen rich zone at the top of the sand bed, nitrification bacteria oxidize amonia and nitrite to nitrate. In the faculative zone,, in a reducing enviroment of low oxygen, bacteria consume nitrate and give off nitrogen gas. In a completly anerobic enviroment, sulfide bacteria also produce denitrifrication chemistry. The faculative bacteria are 100 times more efficiant.

I hope this explains some of the chemistry and biology of a dsb.

La bonne temps roulee,

Patrick

[subsea]

A Jaubert plenum favors bacteria and not biodiversity of micro inverts. In this coarse substrate, amphipods and snails abound. Brittle & Serpent Stars along with Emerald Crabs complete the clean up crew in my coarse substrate used with the Jaubert Plenumn.

Happy Reefing,

Patrick

[Planeden]

I'm not sure whether this is considered a hijack, but this is fascinating. It has also raised a few questions.

1. If you do a DSB in the refugem, the suggested cycling would not be different than a DSB in the DT, right? It seems the time to build the biological filtration in the DSB would take at least as long in the fuge as it would in the larger DT.

2. My baffles in my fuge are barely 6", if that. (used highly accurate finger spread measurement for early discussion). The area is probably 14" x 12" or so. If I use 4" or of substrate and have maybe 6-8" of water above that with macro algae will that be effective? Will I need to worry about spillover of my sand with a maximum of 2" of baffle left on each side?

3. The http://www.chucksaddiction.com/cleanupcrew.html cycle recommendation is 6 - 8 months using uncured live rock. If you are trying grow the biology in the sandbed, is there an advantage to using/purchasing cured live rock?

[subsea]

Yes to question #1.

Not sure about question #2 with respect to spillover.

#3

I would not expect much benefit from cured live rock with respect to seeding a DSB. Reef rubble from an established tank will bring in all the bacteria that you need. Detrivores kits are available from online vendors. Some reef clubs do a mud swap.

[Planeden]

Thanks Patrick. With respect to #2, I'll use some sort of trial and error and see how it does.

As for #1 and #3, I may be back to the original plan of buying uncured rock primairly and a piece or two of cured rock for larger life forms/ biodiversity. Watching to see what crawls out of the rock seems like half the fun, anyway.

[subsea]

For many, hitch hikers are something to prevent. Many will take live rock and cleanse it with hydrogen peroxide.

I am with you on uncured live rock for biodiversity. Because uncured will create an ammonia spike, inoculate your sandbed with bacteria for at least one week. Let ammonia test determine when nitrifying bacteria populations are coping with food input. Unless you have a DSB with de-nitrification bacteria, nitrate will start to rise. It is at this point that CUC should be brought in. Lower lighting is appropriate at this time as a progressive cycle of different micro and macro algae work thru your tank cycle. Once algae cycles have stabilized, it is a good time to add uncured live rock. I do not add much live rock. I use it to introduce biodiversity to the tank, not for bio filtration. Instead of rock, I rely on substrate for bio filtration, micro fauna and fana for multiple nutrient pathways and food webs.