Dirty Sand Bed

[dochardrock]

I need a little advice. My tank is now 8 months old. My fish are in superb condition. I have a few purple and green shrooms and a green feather duster worm that are doing great as well. However, I cannot seem to figure out how to keep my DSB clean. I have been dealing with what I think is a diatome problem for probably 4 months now. I have 10-15 hermits, a sand sifting cucumber, a few astrea snails, and a few cerith snails. The cerith snails have only been in my tank for a couple weeks now. My parameters are all zero, sg is 1.023, alk is 8.7, calcium is good. I am using RO water and carbon. I have a red sea prizm skimmer. My water is crystal clear. My sand bed defies me and will not get clean!!!

I feed only Prime Reef frozen food one block every other day. Any suggestions???
Thanks
Adam

 

[kynekke]

I had that SAME problem! I got rid of it by switching my RO water to RODI and putting in some phosban. After adding the phosban my diatoms were gone in under 24 hours.

 

[m0nk]

The cerith snails will do ok, but they like the glass just as much as the sand, so you'll probably be better off adding some Nassarius snails to help sift the sand. I have both and between them they do a decent job.

 

[earlybird]

My sand wasn't white until I added cerith snails. Now my sand is very white. The only thing I did different was add the cerith but my sand wasn't that bad.

 

[dochardrock]

Bump

 

[scopus tang]

Originally Posted by m0nk
http:///forum/post/2505180
The cerith snails will do ok, but they like the glass just as much as the sand, so you'll probably be better off adding some Nassarius snails to help sift the sand. I have both and between them they do a decent job.
Agree with Monk and the others; also suggest looking for a possible source of phosphate in your tank. What are you running for filtration (if anything)? What size tank?

 

[dochardrock]

its a 40 gal tank. I am running a rena filstar xp3 canister filter with activated carbon and phosban, and a prizm skimmer.

 

[scopus tang]

based on the size of your tank, and the diatom bloom issue, I would think that you should be adding to signigicantly to your snail population. IF you are confident in your sand bed population, you might consider a sand sifting fish like a diamond watchman goby, but they do eat the microorganisms in the LS, so you may not want to go there.