need advice

[MKsreef]

My friend, who just recently started in the SW experience was at a LFS and was talking to an individual who apparently had some experience with SW. He was advising her that as her tank establishes itself, say in a year or two...she would have problems with her tank. He was telling her she should not have sand in her reef tank as it will eventually trap too much debris and such raising the nitrate levels causing corals to die, etc. Now she is panicking and considering removing the sand , feeding every other day, not to feed frozen food but should feed pellets ...

any thoughts or suggestions from those of you who have been doing this for a while...what can we expect in a year or two down the road...

Thanks MK

 

[yote]

Sounds to me like somebody fed your friend a line of:pooh: A good clean up crew should take care of the sand bed,that plus a good maintance routine will go along way. I've had mine going since july and have never dropped the first flake food in,,,only frozen and my nitrates stay right around .5 with a 10% water change every other week. just my thoughts though.

 

[jhnrb]

As long as you have adequate sand stirrers, the substrait is not too deep, and good water motion, you should be ok. always take anyones opinion as just that and research for a larger consensus. I doubt your system will fail in a couple years just because you have a sand bed if you perform your maintenance and have an adequate supply of stirrers.

 

[bkv1997]

Agree with the comments above.

 

[JellyMan]

If you have a tank up for a yr with little to no die off then it will be exceptionally well established as mentioned above get a good detrius cleaner pack and you have it made, gobies, bleanies, sandsifting stars, hermits are just an example any combo of those should keep it right.