deep sand ben in nano?

[weaselslucks]

I have a wonderful pistol shrimp in my 40 gallon. He is doing well but I usually never see him, and he cant build a propper den with my very fine sand. I was at a LFS that had the same shrimp paired with a gobie in their LR tank wich has a very deep sand bed made up of coral bits and sand. The shrip made his home close ot the front glass so that you can see his tunnels and hes always out with the goby. ok now for my question. I i set up say a 10 gallon and make a deep sand bed could i do esentually the same thing with the shrimp or would the tank just go anerobic and posion my $40 shrimp? would a 20 long or a 29 be a better?

[papagimp]

The sandbed going Anerobic is what makes a sandbed beneficial, as this area of low/no oxygen is what supports a type of bacteria that will lower nitrate levels. But there is the risk of toxic gases being released into the tank (I foget the name of this particular gas, my bad) But changing out a sandbed every couple of years would go along way to helping this. As for the tank, a 20L is very shallow and if you added a DSB then you cut out way to much viewing room. I'd go a minimum of a 29g tank. Possibly a 20Tall but there so similar to size of the 29's that I'd just get a 29g. The extra 9 gallons may help a bit.

[weaselslucks]

thanks ofcourse my luck i would set something up and the shrimp would build his hole where i still couldn't see it

[bertoni]

If you want a habitat for a pistol shrimp, a nano would be fine, and a lot of sand is probably okay. I wouldn't worry very much about hydrogen sulfide buildup, but it's likely that the sand might need to be replaced after some period of time, possibly a few years.