Pond Frog,
In the tank pictured, I have a 40watt Uv sterilizer, 1 pentair FB-900 Fluidized Bed Sand Filter for ammonia/Nitrite removal, and 2 Marineland Magnum 350 cannister filters for solids removal and flow. For aeration, I only have two small bubblers that run 24/7.
When I put a huge new bioload in this system, it takes about 3 days for the bacteria to explode in growth in the sand filter before they can remove all the ammonia and food loads.
Bioballs are Okay for most setups, but sand filters have about 10,000 times the surface area and by bouncing around constantly in a fluidized state, dead bacteia is constantly knocked off the sand and a fresh bacteria growth substrate is always available---Bioballs are eficiant for only a short time before the dead bacteria reduces the available area for them to grow on.
Here is the 3 filters, before one went bad---you will see the Black case of the UV sterilizer at the bottom of the picture on the wall...The picture also shows containers of nearly unused Zeolite in the yellow cartons. Aquarium salt is in the blue carton.
This picture shows the lighting and when it was "planted" to raise CNBG and some FH and CC for fun...For Tilapia, I use NOTHING inside the tank to make them easier to net.
This final picture shows the Pentair FB-900 Fluidized Bed Sand filter (clear plastic with a blue top and bottom hanging on the back of the tank) and more plumbing and valving to control flow.
