Sand Critters?

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RLG2182

Aquarium Advice FINatic
Joined
Jan 2, 2005
Messages
819
Location
Rancho Cucamonga, California
Hey guys! :D

My sandbed is kinda boring right now... not much movement to speak of. I added my two O. clowns on monday to my freshly cycled tank. Tested my parameters and they're am0 trite0 trate0 (nitrate was BARELY noticeable, if at all).

What do you think is something cheap & hardy that I could add in to stir up the sand a bit? Was thinking some kind of star or what not... I know there's blenny's out there, but was thinking non-"fish". Ideas? Names would be great so I could look them up online. :D

Thanks!!!
 
serpent stars/brittle stars or sand sifting stars. Also there some kinds of sand sifting gobies. Maybe a horseshoe crab.
 
By the way I went to Cucamonga Jr High for the 6th and 7th grades. My Uncles still live in Ontario and have a big church in Chino. So say hey to smog and traffic for me!
 
I don't believe inverts add a whole lot of bio load but if they do they more than make up for it with their detritus eating ways.
 
electrikat said:
By the way I went to Cucamonga Jr High for the 6th and 7th grades. My Uncles still live in Ontario and have a big church in Chino.

Hah! What a small world this is. I just moved out here with my girlfriend of 3 years. I used to live in La Verne, before going to school in UC Santa Barbara. I live in the new & nice area of Rancho... has everything I need and then some. :D Leave it to us Californians to be scared to venture out to other parts of the country... New York & NJ were nice to visit... but to live... 8O 8O
 
That's the way I feel about California. Both my grandparents are buried in the big military cemetary in Riverside(don't know the name of it though) and we still have friends in Cucamonga, Etiwanda, and Ontario, but I just cannot breath when I'm there so it's strictly small doses when we come there. I'm strictly a Texas girl now. Born and mostly raised.
 
I just added two diamond gobies to my 75. My substrate looks 100% better.. And I was supprised at how "bright" my tank looks now :)
 
I'm a big fan of the decorated goby. Mine is constantly stirring the sand around. Also Nassarius snails burrow into the sand and then leap out at feeding time.
 
Sand sifting star, fighting conchs, reef hermits are all good choices. I would stay away from the horseshoe crab, they get very large and can be very distructve in a tank.
 
In a new tank you may want to hold off on the sand sifting fish till the sand bed critters have a chance to produce. Some of the SS fish only eat theses critters and in a new tank may whip out the population quickly and then slowly starve, the same goes for a SS star.
Serpent stars are cool and you can feed them pieces of shrimp, fish etc.
Pick up a few dozen hermits they will be all over the SB cleaning up waste... They are cool little critters..
 
with the DSB, are you supposed to get critters to stir up the sand or not? I thought it was bad to do this. We just changed to the DSB and if i need to get some sand shifters, please let me know, I don't want to do it wrong.

Thanks!!
 
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