Need advice: Sandbed or Barebottom?

[coralfarmer84]

I'm setting up my 300 gallon tank and just wondering the pros and cons of having a barebottom tank. The only reason I really want a sandbed was for the natural look, but now i'm thinking barebottom will be better. The tank is brand new so i don't want to have any scratches, Its glass. Can someone point me in the right direction, it will be a dominated SPS tank, with lots of fish.

 

[zapata41]

i say go barebottom , just make sure you have lots of flow and a nice sized skimmer. atleast with BB your tank will let you know right away if you are doing a good job with flow and husbandry

Tim

 

[TCU Reefer]

The responses that you'll get to your question will be 50/50. There are pro's and con's for each method. You just have to decide what's important to you.

I went BB beacause I wanted a ton of flow for my SPS without worrying about and blowing around. I also like the fact that I can just stick a hose is the tank and siphon out all the detritus in just minutes. I wanted a very clean tank.

Later down the road, I may add a remote DSB if I deem necessary. It would be easy to plumb to your existing system and you would kind of get the best of both worlds.

My two cents.

 

[drock59]

I say BB with one note....make sure you feed enough. There are quite a few people with problems of having too clean of a tank. You must feed your tank and keep some level of nutrients or your tank will struggle. My two cents.

 

[DaddyJax]

I would actually say that bb may be the way to go for you. I have ssb and dsb and love them but I have found through research and observations that a large tank would do well with a bb as long as it is stocked full of fish and daily/every other day feedings. This will give the corals a healthy source of food and allow a quick and efficient removal of bioload. If you want the sand then I would cut back the stock and you would receive the same results imo.

 

[xtrstangx]

IMO, BB has a lot of benefits without a lot of cons. I decided to go with a SSB since I'd rather it look a little bit better, but I'm planning on putting starboard underneath the sand just in case.

 

[coralfarmer84]

Thanks for the responses. I have a 240 currently and it has a SSB, i will be transferring all my corals and livestock from it to the 300. So I want to be sure I'm doing the right thing first. Sand seems to cause more scratching on my tank than anything else. My tank is dominated sps right now and I have success with the sandbed.... Just to be honest I'm kinda lazy and everything still looks great. I don't do many water changes, will this hurt me with a BB tank or would it be the same. I could always do a DSB in my Fuge/Sump area.

 

[coralfarmer84]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=7663806#post7663806 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by zapata41
atleast with BB your tank will let you know right away if you are doing a good job with flow and husbandry

Tim

That sounds much to risky considering I have thousands of dollars worth of coral going into it right away from a previous tank.

 

[xtrstangx]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=7664732#post7664732 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by coralfarmer84
Thanks for the responses. I have a 240 currently and it has a SSB, i will be transferring all my corals and livestock from it to the 300. So I want to be sure I'm doing the right thing first. Sand seems to cause more scratching on my tank than anything else. My tank is dominated sps right now and I have success with the sandbed.... Just to be honest I'm kinda lazy and everything still looks great. I don't do many water changes, will this hurt me with a BB tank or would it be the same. I could always do a DSB in my Fuge/Sump area.

If it ain't broke, don't fix it.

 

[coralfarmer84]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=7664828#post7664828 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by xtrstangx
If it ain't broke, don't fix it.

I agree with this but I'm just afraid of scratching the new tank, don't want any chances of sand causing scratching thats what worries me. Never had a new tank so with my used ones they were previously scratch but it always felt like the scratches were growing weather or not they were I don't know lol.

 

[Leopardshark]

I would say go with a 1-2" sandbed, the look is more natural and you don´t have the downsides of a DSB, which in my opinion is a time bomb
Mark