Changes out the Deep sand bed

Did it smell ;D you know when all this was dragged out of moth balls after 20 /25 yr's I was shaking my head and when I asked every new guy jumping on the New DSB wagon why there where doing this ?? NO3 amd falling Ph was always the answer . then came the lime water then the two part buffers then then Vodka and sugar carbon stuff for bacter food to consume the NO3 But back in 95 or so I'd ask why not use a no3 coil LOL at that time most had not heard of the coils either and if they did there was no data on them LOL But th DSB had books written on them so it had to work LOL Yes yours was heading south and algae would have been next issue. then sand clumping up like a concrete slab .

 

OOOOOOOHHHHHHHH did it smell. My fiancee walked into the room, mabye 15ft away, glared at me said eewwww gross then turn around and walked out!! way to clear a room. That was before I had even started to pull the sand out. Wasnt a big issue for me, but sure got a good laugh. I couldnt see into the water to tell how much sand I had left.

I just killed off the last of my GHA 3+ months ago. But did notice alot of diatom build on the glass in short amount of time. I also had an inorganic PO4 problem. And I already had some big chunks of "concrete" building up.
You think 5 narrurius (sp?) snail should be enough to keep the sand mixed?
When should i think about/ if at all changing out the sand in the fuge?

 

Yes 5 narrurius will be a good start and they will breed I have had them go crazy in a little tank we had here for a couple of yrs.. put in 10 took out 100 I guess. sand was crawling with them .

Yes the algae is a first indicator as is the PO3 and NO3 problems then its all down hill I find they star at about 16 to 20 months in on average at 30 month the falling Ph and sand getting hard as a rock then at about 36 months they simple erupt up and kills everything..

As for the fuge leave that its fine that is the only place for a DSB really . Nothing should be in there to uncap it and even if it does the plants will be fine . Plus they are keeping that bed as food storage ..and they keep it cleand up. Just don't allow any digging animals in there.

 

Could the sand be not taken out with a sand vacumn? or would that disturb it and add too much junk to the water?

 

i had an algae problem from the start. The more i think it about and talk about it. The happier i am that i took the time to knock this issue out before it got to late.

It would work to get out most of it. But I didnt want to take the chance. If you would have seen the water you would think the same thing.

 

I was going to take some of mine out too. Not all of it, but I thought about using the vacuum for some. Think it would pollute the water too much or should I just wait and scoop out what I want out when I drain my tank? Sorry don't mean to jack your thread, but it's hitting on the same things I'm going through now too.

 

no worries about jacking the thread. It would be safer to drain and scoop and drain the rest. You could siphon out a little at a time, but you run the chance of kicking up the "junk" if the siphon breaks. In your case, if you are careful you should be able to siphon out what you want gone.

 

Yeah, any time I've ever vacuumed the sand off, I've noticed I've pulled up a lot into my bucket, if I controlled it, so yeah I will try that. Thanks sucka!!

 

good luck, just dont rush it!

 

That's exactly the idea of it all!