Remote DSB?

[TexasState]

http://www.ecosystemaquarium.com/html/News.html
Does anybody have experience w/ putting a Deep Sand Bed in their sump?

I'm thinking about either using 20 pounds of Miracle Mud by itself in the sump

or

put a DSB in the sump, w/ 10 pounds sprinkle of Miracle Mud on top of the DSB.

[Henry]

I don't have any personal experience, but I have seen some 10gal nanos that have a 45gal sump and a dsb in there. So apparently it can work. I don't think I matters where it is located just so the water circulates thru that area. just my opinion.

Henry

[matt]

Hey Vinh;

I'm sure you've seen Shimek's articel on DSB on his board at reefcentral. The relevent thing here is that he feels that you need about a 1/2square meter of area to get enough biodiversity and area of low oxygen to get real nitrate reduction for the bed. This is about the size of a 45 breeder. Anything much smaller, and Shimek says it won't work in the same way, regardless of depth. Is your sump big enough to satisfy that requirement?

Matt

[Chris]

Something else to add.. since more and more you see people complaining about the DSB's bombing on them....

Setting one up should be done properly and realistically they shouldn't be handling as heavy a bioload as some people do. I see a lot of people setup a tank with a DSB and immediately start stocking their tanks like the DSB is an immediate filtration system to replace anything else.

Sadly many have been finding out that's not the way it works. Ideally, you want to not only start slow... but with a remote DSB tank you want a much larger (or lightly stocked main tank) for it to be most effective.