Restarted tank

[GaryP]

Hino,

I'm confused. Do you have sand under the screen? Only water should be under the screen in a plenum. That's the purpose of the screen, to create an anoxic cavity under the sand bed.

The purpose of the burrowing critters is to turn the sand over and eat any detritus that accumulates there. The critters aren't going to penetrate through the screen. I have a sand sifting star I will give you if you want it.

[Thunderkat]

From the article I read you need two sets of screens. One set keeps sand from getting into the plenum area, the second screen covers the bottom 2 inches of sand to keep the digging and burrowing animals out of the bottom layer of sand.

The top of layer of sand is left free for the critters to burrow and play in.

[GaryP]

Well, the top layer is where the detritus and nutrients are going to accumulate. I see what they are talking about. They don't want the bottom layer of sand being oxygenated by the critters. I've never seen a plenum set up with two layers though. I doubt many critters are going to burrow that deep anyway, especially if there isn't any food down there.

[Thunderkat]

My Tunze is doing a good job of keeping the sand oxygenated. Every few days I have to go back and level out the sand.

I found the optimum place to put the Tunze to cause the minimum amount of sand blowing but it still makes a little sand dune that moves over a period of a few days.

I want to lower the amount of current caused by the Tunze but not cut it out completly. The only thing I can think of is either putting lots of rocks in the tank (not suppose to be done with jauber system) or putting lots of fake plants in there (highly ugly).

One idea I had is to get a stand to put on the sand to hold live rock on but I haven't seen anything I could use (the ones that were perfect were made of metal and I can't use that).

Anybody have any ideas on how to reduce current on the sand without covering up more than 30% of sand bed and without taking the pump out (or plugging it up)?

[GaryP]

You can use some plate LR resting on a few pieces of LR to create a base on which to stack your rockscape.

[alexwolf]

i think Felipe has some plate rock, pretty reasonably priced too.

[GaryP]

I know that Texas Todd did something very much like what I am describing in his 92 gal. corner and it looked awesome.