sand sifters

[SaltWaterNewbie]

So what are some good sand sifters?? Sand sifting starfish any good? Or the gobies? Enquiring minds wanna know... :p

[undrwata]

You must be very careful when adding these sorts of inhabitants to a reef tank....sand sifting starfish will all but annihilate your pod population, many gobies can destroy work rock work ( rock scape) by digging under it so much…I personally have found great success with fighting conches and tiger tail cucumbers…I also like my snails that stay to the bottom …but that’s just me.

HTH ;)

[SaltWaterNewbie]

Which snails? The Cerith snail? Are those the sand sifting ones? I already have in the tank 2 turbo's, 3 margarita, and 4 Astrea. And I'm affraid of the cucumbers. With my luck they'll die and poison the tank.

Fighting conches? I've heard of those thrown around here before but don't know anything about them. I searched yahoo for a pic or something and the best one I could find was a thread here...go figure...hehe. But still no info. Know of any online stores that sell them??

[johnniazi]

I have two of the white diamond goby...it's solid white with orange spots very nice looking. They are amazing....good job cleaning!!!!
This is one fish I definitely recommend....

Thanks.

[SaltWaterNewbie]

Yah I was looking at one of those to get. But I heard they need at least a 50gal tank...I only have a 25. :(

[rburrell]

SaltWaterNewbie,

I was able to find fighting conch's on etropicals.

http://www.etropicals.com/product/prod_Display.cfm?siteid=43&pCatId=1336

I was tempted to buy one recently, but it sounds like I'm in the same boat as you with respect to tank size.

You may have seen this thread already, but here's some more info..

http://archive.reefcentral.com/vbulletin/showthread.php?threadid=126629&goto=newpost

Good luck,
RB

[ozmonster]

Saltwaternewbie:

Why would you want any so-called sandsifters?

Sandsifters like sand-sifting stars, gobies, etc. eat the animals that keep your biological filter, or deep sand bed, alive and flourishing.

As your sand bed matures, bacteria collects on and in the space between individual sand grains. Very rapidly, this bacteria reaches a saturation poit whereby all the spaces are filled. At this point, your biological filter stops. It takes animals such as worms, pods, tiny snails and bacteria eating microorganisms to eat the bacteria. (these animals also slowly move water deep into the sand as they move up and down) This starts the whole process over and you DSB functions once more (until the next build-up). Eventually, the system reaches equillibrium.

But what happens when you introduce sandsifting stars or predatory snails or sand-sifting fish? Yep, you guessed it, they eat the animals that eat the bacteria and , once again, your sand bed stops (when bacteria reach saturation).

oz

ps cerith snails, although travelling through sandbed, are not predatory snails. They eat bacteria and algea.

[ozmonster]

fighting conchs are not predatory snails so they are OK vis a vis your sandbed. However, they grow fast and require lots of sand surface space. I suggest you do some research on whether you will have enough room.

oz

[ozmonster]

Saltwaternewbie:

I just noticed you are from sacramento. Are you a member of MARS?

oz

[SaltWaterNewbie]

I was just looking for something to keep the sand looking "clean." I have had a major algae problem and figure if somethign was down there stiring it up, it would help some. BUT, the last few says the algae has't been no where ner as bad. I can actually go 3 days now beore I have to clean it.

My sand bed is not deep at all. I would like to put maybe another 15-20lbs of LS in there...right now there's maybe 19lbs of aragonite (25gal tank). But I was told that because of my tank size, a deep sand bed wouldn't benefit me.

MARS? Is that the club i see advertised at capitol aquarium? Or something else?

Cerith snails...hmmm...ok, I'll look into some of those.

[ozmonster]

saltwaternewbie:

I've got a 25g reef set up right now with a 4" sand bed and it looks great. The sand bed is very important as a biological filter. Read some of Dr. Shimek's articles on reefkeeping.com. He'll give you the motivation you need to put that extra sand in. Also make sure the grain size is smaller than sugar fine (.01 - .05).

If you want something to keep the sand surface clean then stick to brittlestars, scarlet hermits, blue legged hermits. But you never want to stir/clean the sand bed. That will kill all the beneficial animals that are eating your beneficial bacteria and keeping it from clogging up the whole process. Dr. Shimek can explain better.

If you want some ceriths, I've a lot in my 125g. I can give you a dozen or so little ones to get you started (they stay small compared to turbos or mexicans).

Yeah, MARS is the marine aquarists roundtable of sacramento.



Its a cool place to meet other reefers and you get a 10% discount on livestock at exotic, o street and aqualife. You should check it out.

oz

[SaltWaterNewbie]

Cool man...thanks. Where did you get your sand? Local? or online? And is it ok to put the sand on top of the aragonite? The tanks been setup since about July and I've had a major prob with the algae. THICK brown algae all over everything! I tried to leave it as long as I could but I couldn't take it any more and have been cleaning it. And yes sifting the bottom. Although I did get a turkey baster and have been sucking up the algae from the sand which seems to help some as well. But as of late like I saidin an earlier post, I can pretty much go three days before I have to clean it. I did a 5 gal water change Thursday, probably going to do another one today. I get the water from capitol....it's not tap. :)

I'm hoping as soon as I can get he algae prob and additional sand in the tank, I'll be able to get corals again!! This waiting stuff is killing me!!

I'll try and remember to take a pic of it today before I clean it again so you can check it out.

here's my email address...
brian@midtown.net

Thanks again!!

[wizardgus®]

From what I have been able to gather from Dr. Ron you want something to stir the sand..but not sift it. Sifters are lokking to eat the little critters in there. I got some sand bed clams from IPSF, and some of those dwarf zebra hermits. Also have cerith and nassarius snails. I have a 29g. BTW. I know that Dr. Shimek wouldn't approve of the hermits..but these are tiny. About half the size of the commonly available dwarf red-tipped Mexican ones. Seem to be interested in the algae. I think a decent size Pod could kick their ***! HTH

[ozmonster]

brian:

what are your water parameters, lighting, skimmer, etc. The solution to your algea problem may lie in a variety of places. If its brown algea, it is generally diatomatic. This is very normal for a tank only 3 or 4 months old. Diatom eaters are turbo snails, mexicans (but the crap too much and tend to bulldoze), astreas and ceriths.

Keep adding DI water from Capitol (i dont think their water is RO also but I may be wrong) or call around because you likely can find a better price (make sure you ask if RO/DI). Eventually it is cost effective to buy your own RO/DI filter.

I actually got my sand from a MARS member who drove to the bay area and worked a deal for a truck load. It is aragonite (.01-.05). I mixed that with the araganite (20lb. bags) from exotic that is rated 0 but is really (.01-.09) with the majority on the latter half. That stuff will work for you. It is small enough and grain size does shrink as aragonite slowly dissolves.

give me an email if you want to come p/u those ceriths. I'm out in pocket.

ozmonster@yahoo.com

[TacoKing]

I've got the same problem. I don't want to put any hermits in my tank, those guys are snail killers. I have a few turbos and other snails, but no cerths or other sand sifting snails. I did pick up a cucumber on Friday and I'm seeing how he does. He really hasn't moved a whole lot since I introduced him to the tank, he basically crawled under a rock and has been moving slowly around in that area. My next purchase I think will be some sort of goby to clean the sand. I doubt one goby and a cucumber will really hurt the population of the bacteria and animals in my sandbed, it's a 4 - 5" bed in a 110 gallon tank.

[Toutouche]

Tacoking, do you know the type of cuke you got? Is it a mopper, or a sifter, this is important as there are 2 types and the sifter type is not what you want. If it has a lot of tentacles around it's mouth, then it is the good type. Also, be patient, these guys will take quite a while sometimes too get accustomed to the tank. If you have a tigertail type, they will hide during the day mostly, and come out at night.
Hermit crabs are kind of old school these days, not the best thing to have in a t ank. The best is different types of snails. Ones that come to mind right now are Cerith, Astrea, Turbo ( these will knock over things that aren't attached firmly however),and Nassarius snails. The Nassarius and Cerith's will bury and move the sand as they crawl around. The Cerith's will spawn all the time, making yummy coral food, and if enough of them get to grow, then you have some to either sell, or trade in at the LFS. In my tank, I have around 15, and I see them spawning almost every 2 or 3 days. I have lots of tiny baby white snails crawling around all the time ( almost so tiny that if you're not lookingfor them, you'll miss them). Conchs are also great. Brittlestars will not stir the sand, and don't really do anything for cleaning it, as they are scvengers that will crawl around on the rockwork and sand looking for meaty foods, and leftovers.