FishProfiles.com Message Forums

I'm about to do my first water change on my new 90-gallon marine tank. It's loaded with live rock, though, and I can't figure out how to gravel vac around it. The "bell" part of the siphon isn't going to fit between it and the glass in most places, and I also can't figure out how to clean inside all the little caves in the base of the rock.

(If I take the bell off the siphon, the water change will take forever.)

Any suggestions?

What kind of substrate are you using? Is it crushed coral or Sand?

If its sand then you dont have to (and shouldnt) do any kind of vac...as far as the rock, it doesnt really need anything either except for an occasional blast with a turkey baster then siphon water out of the tank.

Just a tip...

If it's sand, make sure you have critters to stir it up, like a SSS or mischievious gobies and blennies or something. You should make sure there's no dead areas in your tank, where detritus can settle on the substrate. Configure your powerheads in such a way to avoid this.

-Formerly known as the Ferretfish

It's aragonite sand.

Does that mean that all I have to do is siphon out some water and replace it?

There's also some dispute as to whether I should use powerheads -- some people say yes, some say no. I have a clownfish who isn't the greatest swimmer, so I'm not using them right now, but I do have a couple I can put in the tank if it's a good idea.

Also, blennies might work ... inverts are out because there's a triggerfish in the tank who would consider them appetizers.

I wouldnt put in a blenny or a sand sifting star, but I like my critters in my sand to stay in the sand instead of being eaten.

All you have to do is siphone water since you are using sand...makes it easy doesnt it

As for the powerheads, I would use them. Your clown may seem like a poor swimmer, but I bet he would love the current from powerheads. Atleast add them and aim them towards the surface for increased 02.

I wouldnt put in a blenny or a sand sifting star, but I like my critters in my sand to stay in the sand instead of being eaten

Well I wouldn't have suggested that if I had known there was a large aggressive trigger in the tank now would I.


Powerheads are ugly. Effective, but try other ways to keep things more hidden, like Oceans Motions units, or SeaSwirls, Tunze systems, there's a lot of options.


-Formerly known as the Ferretfish

I wasnt stating that because of the trigger.....I was stating that I like my pods and worms to stay in the sand instead of being eaten by the sand sifting star and blenny.

Ahh...got it. My mistake, I misunderstood.

Good thing there are ways to culture pods to keep nice populations going, b/c I do feel that it's important to have something keep the sand bed slightly sifted.

-Formerly known as the Ferretfish

thats where your nassarius vibex snails come into play

They wont eat any critters out of the DSB?


(Side note...people are trying to convince me to get rid of my DSB already, b/c no substrate means better flow for SPS...)

-Formerly known as the Ferretfish

nope, they wont feed on critters in the sand bed, purely left over food and detrius.

Bah, people are just hopping on the bandwagon with the "OMG DSB's are evil and there is no way you can keep the sand on the bottom of the tank and have enough flow for SPS"

Bull....and Ill prove it when I have 3 hammerheads running on my tank with a DSB.

People confuse two things when talking about pumps and return lines on a tank....those two things are Velocity and flow. You dont want velocity, you want the flow....most people dont understand how to get that and run huge pumps. They get velocity instead and it creates a sand storm.

"OMG DSB's are evil and there is no way you can keep the sand on the bottom of the tank and have enough flow for SPS"

You can say that again. ] It's driving me nuts...but I'm determined to get the effect of NNR with my sand bed, and be totally stocked with acros and SPS galore.

My return line has a pretty strong current coming out of it; we've got one of the locline "spreader" attatchments on it. The 4 lines on my super squirt do a pretty good job...and if necessary I'm sure I can figure out another way to add more flow.

A friend in my club brought up a good point to me; I'm going to have shadows in my tank from the pipes along the top. No? *freaking out* I dont really want 4 arm shaped shadows on my tank...

-Formerly known as the Ferretfish