We are talking about California Blackworms arn't we? B/C I have never seen that behaviour from them at all. Mine just bury themselves in the sand and stay there.
Best wishes,
Wes
How Freshwater Deep Sand Beds Work
- Thread starter DeeDeeK
- Start date
Best wishes,
Wes
yeah these are california black worms...i had some left over from feeding my main tanks and just dumped some in the invert tank to see what theyd do
I have a question. I have close to 3inches of tehetian moon black sand. Is that too fine of a sand that a DSB won't work?
Also is the only thing i really need to do to create a DSB is add blackworms and MTS and maybe some plenaria??? I already have my tank cycled.
Also is the only thing i really need to do to create a DSB is add blackworms and MTS and maybe some plenaria??? I already have my tank cycled.
TMS is OK for the sand bed but my experiend has only been with Paver leveling sand.
As fo Fauna add as much diversity as possible. Plants, worms of differents varieties, MTS, etc.
You will have Pockets developing but do not disturbe them, they will release naturally.
It has been my experience that it takes about three months for a tank to become etablished well enough to begin adding "high" life forms such as fish even though the tank is "fully cycled". The worms and such need to be feed regularly fish flakes and the MTS will certainly eat that.
I used Spirulina discs broken up into pieces as well as flakes.
Hope this helps.
Best wishes,
Wes
If I were an MTS, I know I'D eat the eggs of fish, but that's just me...;-)
My experience is as Wes'. Three months is a good period too let the tank mature. My cali blackworms love spirulina disks and generally like whatever my otocinclus suckmouth catfish enjoy.
My experience is as Wes'. Three months is a good period too let the tank mature. My cali blackworms love spirulina disks and generally like whatever my otocinclus suckmouth catfish enjoy.
Forgive me if this question has been answered somewhere in this long thread, but I was wondering just what kind of sand you use and where you get it. I don't think I would ever do the very fine sand like children's sandbox play sand. At Meijer they have a sand in their display tanks that is coarse more like very fine gravel, with grains about 2 mm in diameter. But they don't have any like that available for purchase. I've read about using Quikrete traction sand or pool filter sand. Something like this is what I'd like to try some day. I've used UGFs for many years and switched to reverse UGF several years ago when my cories kept dying. UGF would be completely incompatible with deep sand bed, right?
I use paver sand found at home depot or DIY or what ever bigbox building / home center you might have in your area. It costs about $4.00 per bag and 1 bag is just enough to do a 10 gallon aquarium for a true Deep Sand Bed (DSB). You cannot use an UGF or a RUGF with a DSB.
I recommend sand of .2 to .5 diameter grain size, which is to say that it's been meshed such that no grains outside that range are included. This leaves an excellent balance of surface area to interstial space (open space between grains) allowing good rates of diffusion up and down through the substrate, which will keep the lower reaches from becoming supersaturated with H2S and other toxic products of decay.
Phone building supply suppliers - sand and gravel quarries, that sort of thing. Ask if they can double mesh sand for you and what it will cost. They'll quote by the TON! Won't be as much as you might expect. Several people going in on it together, take what you want and maybe the supplier can just take back the rest and re -sell it if you don't a a large bin to store it in. Sounds like a chore, but you can re sell the sand at 50 cents a pound if you can find folks interested.
My LFS started carrying this sand soon after I specified it in this article here: http://www.wetwebmedia.com/ca/volume_7/volume_7_1/dsb.html
I can't prove anything but I do feel proud when I see those bags of sand in the LFS. Many deep sand bed, planted freshwater tank folk in this city are using this sand and I've heard nothing other than good things. The LFS owner told me he thinks they cycle in about half the time of un-meshed sad.
I agree with Wes, UGFs and RUGFs pro'ly won't work with it and would eliminate the anaerobic and anoxic regions so would result in less fertile substrate and much less denitrification.
Phone building supply suppliers - sand and gravel quarries, that sort of thing. Ask if they can double mesh sand for you and what it will cost. They'll quote by the TON! Won't be as much as you might expect. Several people going in on it together, take what you want and maybe the supplier can just take back the rest and re -sell it if you don't a a large bin to store it in. Sounds like a chore, but you can re sell the sand at 50 cents a pound if you can find folks interested.
My LFS started carrying this sand soon after I specified it in this article here: http://www.wetwebmedia.com/ca/volume_7/volume_7_1/dsb.html
I can't prove anything but I do feel proud when I see those bags of sand in the LFS. Many deep sand bed, planted freshwater tank folk in this city are using this sand and I've heard nothing other than good things. The LFS owner told me he thinks they cycle in about half the time of un-meshed sad.
I agree with Wes, UGFs and RUGFs pro'ly won't work with it and would eliminate the anaerobic and anoxic regions so would result in less fertile substrate and much less denitrification.
