40 gallon Reef Journal
- Thread starter jumpfreak26
- Start date
why is that? why have i not heard of this? i heard instable calcium levels over time....but thats it.
I also went with crushed coral over sand because i really hate the look of sand, dunno why, but i really dont like it
i just researched it and some say the only downfall is lack of surface area compared to sand....but i will be building a custom sump in a few weeks with a huge refug, will probably go with sand in there.....
EDIT
so this ridiculous jerk off ebay had a remora for 60 with 9 days left. I emailed him with an offer for 90 dollars. he said sure. he said he would ship it the next day. havent talked to the @#$%@#$ since. now he has got the skimmer back up on ebay and never notified me, and i almost payed him over paypal since i figured thats what he was waiting for. URGH!
I also went with crushed coral over sand because i really hate the look of sand, dunno why, but i really dont like it
i just researched it and some say the only downfall is lack of surface area compared to sand....but i will be building a custom sump in a few weeks with a huge refug, will probably go with sand in there.....
EDIT
so this ridiculous jerk off ebay had a remora for 60 with 9 days left. I emailed him with an offer for 90 dollars. he said sure. he said he would ship it the next day. havent talked to the @#$%@#$ since. now he has got the skimmer back up on ebay and never notified me, and i almost payed him over paypal since i figured thats what he was waiting for. URGH!
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Crushed coral traps detritus which decays and increases the nitrates in your water over time. Unless you keep it pristine clean it will become a nitrate trap. If using it I would only keep a minimum like 1/2 to 1 inch depth and keep it stirred up to ensure you don't get any buildup in it. Preferrably I would remove it and put in sand only.......and I am a strong proponent of a deep sand bed and if done properly at the proper depths will act as a denitrifyer....converting it to nitrogen which percolates out of the sand. You can actually see it working and bubbles forming along the glass.
I will have a few sandsifting gobies, snails(dunno if they help or not) and dunno. Haven gone over my fish list thoroughly, suggestions?
as for the substrate, i really dont feel like throwing away 60 dollars worth of perfectly fine CC, for perfectly fine sand......well see how the funds will take it. Is it possible to remove alittle and put an inch of sand over the top? Im not made of money, and wish i could have been told earlier.
as for the substrate, i really dont feel like throwing away 60 dollars worth of perfectly fine CC, for perfectly fine sand......well see how the funds will take it. Is it possible to remove alittle and put an inch of sand over the top? Im not made of money, and wish i could have been told earlier.
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Well another issue is you shouldn't keep sand sifting gobies with crushed coral as it is too coarse for them to move through their gills, they prefer small sugar sized sand. I wouldn't mix the two......If the only thing you ever waste your money on is $60 worth of crushed coral you should thank your lucky stars...I wouldn't want to add up the cost of all the misguided purchases I have made in this hobby.......lights being the most costly pieces of waste that I have, powerheads another, so mistakes are made and the best we do is move on.
Just think if you don't replace it and when you get your corals and everything up and running and then everything dies b/c of bad water condition because of all the stuff trapped in your CC, then you will wish you had spent 60 to replace it! Now you will have wasted all the money on dead corals fish etc... Just save yourself the headach and take it out, gotta wait for the cycle anyways, not like you can put fish in there right now so take a week or 2 and save up some money and get sand..
Ok, so i removed the caribsea crushed coral, the other stuff is basically sand, slightly larger. i took all the CC i could out of the display, and put it in the fuge. Now before you jump on me, we are making a custom acrylic sump to fit in the stand to maximize water and sump space. The new sump will be 2 feet wide, 1 1/2 ft deep, and about 16" tall. fuge will be 12" tall, so i have room for a DSB. i will put the CC as a base and put 3-4 more inches of sand on top in the fuge. I dont beleive there is a problem with that, as there will be 4 -5 inches of sand on top. as 15 lbs in a 16"X16" space will be about an inch or two. if you see any problems with this please let me know. I will post pics later of the size of CC and the other "sand" its pretty small. like, from the ball point of a pen to the tip of a dull pencil.....if you can imagine that lol
Update 3/24/08
little update. My tanks is growing full of diatoms, and i recently removed all the crushed coral that i could. Parameters are all over the board tho.
Ammonia:2 ppm
Nitrite: .5 ppm
Nitrate: about 15 ppm hard to tell
Kinda weird, slow I guess. My temperature isnt the highest. About 74 F. Pretty low(only had a little thermometer, just put a bigger one in until i get a good set of 100w). So maybe that could be slowing it down.... Anyways I have pics. The second are of some little starfsih hitchhikers that came from the stores rock tank. i have walked by during the day and they are in different spots and at night in the tiny LR holes
Enjoy!
They are blue little ones. i found them out on an ID site in the ID sticky.
little update. My tanks is growing full of diatoms, and i recently removed all the crushed coral that i could. Parameters are all over the board tho.
Ammonia:2 ppm
Nitrite: .5 ppm
Nitrate: about 15 ppm hard to tell
Kinda weird, slow I guess. My temperature isnt the highest. About 74 F. Pretty low(only had a little thermometer, just put a bigger one in until i get a good set of 100w). So maybe that could be slowing it down.... Anyways I have pics. The second are of some little starfsih hitchhikers that came from the stores rock tank. i have walked by during the day and they are in different spots and at night in the tiny LR holes
Enjoy!
They are blue little ones. i found them out on an ID site in the ID sticky.
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From what I understand, the presence of nitrites will skew your nitrate test, so it's probably not worth checking until your ammonia/nitrites have dropped to zero.