Dirty Sand

[djscribz]

this is such a noob question and im pretty embarassed, but thats what you guys are here for so here it goes.

I got a 20g with 20g sump/refugium that has been running for a month.

Prior to that, all LS and LR has been in a system that ran since november so about 5 months.

my sand is dirty with detritus or algae, i dont know which. its brown and is lightly distributed on certain parts of the main display. im guessing its deadspots in the tank, im running a mag 5 return on a split loc line. i get decent surface agitation and the turnover rate is about 8x tank volume which should be more than enough for a 20g with softies.

how do i clean this sand up? is my tank established for a star? sand sifting goby?

im guessing no on the goby because i got a mandarin (alive for 2 months, fed by tank only) and i dont want him to have to compete for food.

any recommendations or ideas are graciously welcome.

 

[djscribz]

CUC info: 10 nassarius, 3 hermit, 3 turbo, 3 cleaner shrimp, 2 astrea in main tank

1 turbo, 3 hermit, 3 nasarrius in refugium

 

[MrMikeB]

Chris,

Have you looked into Ceriths to add to the mix? I also find hermits will surprisingly filter the sand but only the top layer. Nassarius are cool and work wonders too, but the jumbos are obviously bigger and can push around more sand. A smaller sand sifting star would also be ideal here too.

If you want immediate results, you could always 'wash' the sand. Here is what I have done when I think my sand is too suspect to use:

Take your sand out and put a good amount in a bucket
Add water (does not have to be salt, but clean water)
Give that baby a good stir to a point where you have a good vortex going
Suck out the water while the sand is just starting to settle.
Repeat a couple times and voila clean sand!

Keep in mind doing so will destroy any bacteria (good or bad), any pods you have, and will start the sand bed over. I would recommend this as a last resort and only if you have adequate bio filtration via live rock so as to not put your system in shock. (Given the softies you probably will be fine).

Another idea:
You might also just need to manually stir the sand up yourself to get it turned over. I would do this in sections as not to stir it up so much that your filters cannot keep up with the load. At least with this direction you would not need to restart the sandbed but have added risk of stirring up something too much and have a small spike not to mention it probably will not look too nice for a little while. For my smaller tanks I used to do this when I added fresh water back in from a water change. I poured it via bucket so that it would cause the sand to get all stirred up and then use a baster to get what little was actually attached to the rock after it was done.

Hope this gives you a couple ideas!