Benefits of going bare bottom ?

[drew930]

Ive always used sand in the past with my tanks and thought about going bare bottom . I think it looks good if you put a mat underneath that fits the tank. I just think that the fact that the bottom glass with a black mat will be darker than sand, it will draw attention to the livestock better. I have few questions that I thought I'd ask. If all is okay, then I might finally try it.

What are the benefits to going bare bottom ? Is the only thing beneficial , being that there is one less spot for build up of "bad things" ?

Anyone wish they didn't go BB after trying it ?

I think it looks good when the bottom is kept clean, but what happens when flakes from the rocks fall off or waste or food builds up. Does it look terrible ?

 

[ca1ore]

I just think BB tanks end up looking messy as it ends up being impossible to really keep the bottom 'clean'. Plus, aesthetically, I always try to make my reef tanks look as natural as possible - and all reefs I've ever gone diving on had sand! I don't see a downside to sand as long as you are using live rock and buy a CUC that includes things that live in the sand. Lastly, I keep sand burrowing fish, so BB doesn't really work for them.

 

[Mr. Brooks]

They're beneficial in tanks with a high amount of flow. SPS tanks for example. You can crank up powerheads and not be concerned with a sand storm. Also if your tank is acrylic you have less chance of scratching it.

They can look awkward at first but in a mature tank you don't really notice it, in my opinion.

 

[reelfishy]

Turn up the volume! With a proper clean up crew, and occasional turkey baster siphon, you can keep the bottom clean.

 

[Susan Lohrer]

My bare-bottom quarantine tank always has poop and junk on the bottom of it between water changes (it just has a HOB filter, so not a lot of flow). I think it looks yucky. My DT probably doesn't have enough flow over the sand, because the sand won't stay white and pretty, and I think that looks yucky, too.

I saw a big tank (huge--it was a shark tank) with only a little sand and a lot of flow, and most of the bottom was bare, with a sort of sandbar formed by the flow. It looked cool.

 

[drew930]

Thanks for all the replies. Ive already decided to stay with sand due to the replies. lol

It will not be a very high flow tank , so stuff will probably stay on the bottom an look terrible, and I like gobies too !

 

[ACBlinky]

My tank isn't super high-flow, and there is NO detritus on the bottom. The starboard under the rocks is purple with coralline, and just looks like an extension of the rockwork; from across the room, it's not at all noticeable.

I know this has been said many times before, but in many places, a natural reef (in the ocean) doesn't have any sand; it's rock/rubble all the way down. The way we typically structure our tanks with sand bottoms isn't natural, per se, it's just pretty.

My leathers shed branches regularly, and the flow pattern tosses them to the back of the tank, near the overflow. As a result, I now have a little forest of leather trees populating the back, starting to grow up the back wall and overflow.

Our GSP is really taking off, and since these polyps will grow nearly anywhere, I'm going to transplant a patch onto the starboard bottom; within a few months, we'll have neon green and purple polyps covering the bottom. I'd much prefer to look at zoas and star polyps than sand packed full of detritus... but it's totally a personal choice. I don't think I'll ever go back. Bare-bottom is clean, after a while it totally blends in with the rockwork/coral growth, and I saved quite a bit of money on sand too!

 

[Eric45]

I don't know about a mat on the bottom. Seems like a good place to trap detritus, food etc..

 

[Clam guy]

I think bb tanks are easier to clean. But they definately don't look as good as a sand bottom.

 

[gbru316]

Minimal detritus on the bottom of my 10g, with up to 1300 gph of water movement.

It all settles in one of the AIO chambers where it gets siphoned weekly.

 

[slief]

I prefer bare bottom. There is less maintenance in that you don't have to constantly vacuum to eliminate detritus. The upside is a cleaner tank with less sources for nitrates. If you have high flow, it allows you to suspend most of the stuff that would normally settle into the sand. Once suspended, it can get carried out into the overflow and be filtered out by filter socks and or your protein skimmer.

As for the looks.. I like having the bottom of my tank covered in coralline algae. It looks good and gives a great area for corals to grow. Over time, the bottom ends up looking like it's part of the rock formation.

When I switched from my sand/crushed coral bottom back to a bare bottom, most of my nuisance algae issue went away and my tank has been healthier since. I no longer have to worry about a piece of sand getting into my cleaning magnets and scratching my acrylic which is another upside.

 

[Green Chromis]

:fish1: I set up a Caribbean style reef tank full of gorgonians and sand. Sand is a very natural part of the Caribbean reefs and many Pacific reefs. I think tanks with some sand are more natural looking than bare bottom tanks. I also like the biodiversity that live sand collected from the reef area adds to my tank.:fish1:

 

[pompeyjohn]

One advantage of going bare bottom is that you don't need much of a cuc.

 

[Crimson]

The other plus going BB is you don't have to worry about streak marks.