tank maintance

Being relitively new to the hobby I have a question about cleaning the sand bed. I have a ssb and tho I do monthly water changes I have never siphoned the sand bed or rock. I could use help with this. Will the sand get siphoned out?

 

If you have a ssb there should be no need to clean the bed unless it is crushed coral. The bed should be self cleaning with the flora and fauna it contains. The sand will come out if the flow is too high in your siphon. You can use a turkey baster to blast detritus of the rocks just before you siphon the water out during your change.

 

thanks 2in10.... should i do that with every water change

 

i do it as needed and if you have coral thay love it when you do that sturrs up food for them so dont be supprised when you get alot of action from them when you blow off the rocks

 

I blow off my rocks weekly before I do a WC. Cant say about your sandbed. My tank is barebottom. But if it were me and I had a sallow sand bed I would clean it aleast once a mo, IMO

 

I used to have a 3" sandbed on my old display tank. I had to do very little maintenance on it since the flow would take out all debris quickly. But for the low flow areas, I'd use a gravel cleaner and siphon out the dirt on the sandbed. I'd stick the gravel cleaner deep and it would stop the siphon for a while, so it would only siphon out little sand, if any. But that sand is already dirty anyway, so I'd just let it get siphoned out.

 

I siphon my sand bed. I put the tube in the sand and once the sand reaches the top of the siphon tube, I kink the hose and let the sand fall back down. Then I do the same through out the tank. I don't have any sand in my bucket when I do it this way.

 

I have a diamond goby no need to siphon sand

 

+1 Great lil fish