Decorating or w/e my tank..

[Ash]

Ok so as alot of you know my cichlid tank went bye bye. I got home today and my dad felt bad for partly helping in the killing of my cichlids which was an accident so he decided to help by cleaning out the tank with water and he got rid of the sand and all my filter extras (the sponge, carbon, etc.. not the actual filter) and of course he didnt need to get rid of that I could have fixed the filter stuff but ne ways he was trying to do the nice thing, so its ok. Well now I am at the point where I have an empty glass 30gal. I am debating should I do sand, gravel, or river rock? I like the sand but its a pain. I am gonna add in rocks and maybe the tree stump things I had in last time for hiding spots but in the end I am gonna do it up with lots of rocks so I am thinking sand would look best but I cant make up my mind so I wanted other opnions, what do you all think would be better? Any Ideas?

 

[jayswan04]

well personally i like sand myself i like the way it looks and the fish poo doesnt seem to penetrate like loose gravel i mean it seems to lay on top which makes vacuming much easier. the only down fall is a couple times a month u wanna stir up the sand and release all the bad gasses that get trapped under it. and that loose sand floating around can play havok on ur impellers so what i do is wrap and rubber band poly fill around the intakes of my filters b4 i stir up the sand so the fine particulate stays out of my impeller. i hope my humble opinion helps u out in some way shape or form.

 

[rallysman]

pool
filter
sand


Harleyk will disagree shortly

 

[turtall]

River rock. And glamorous avatars.

 

[twk1]

I would definately go with Sand Again, sand makes the aquarium look great and very natural! All the fish waste just stays on the surface of the sand so you know exactly where to vacuum when its water change time. Just be careful and not siphon out the sand. Yea... add rocks and create caves. What type of fish are you planning to put in the 30 now? Are you going to do another african tank again?

 

[Taboojen]

I personally like the look of black gravel, black background and lots of river rocks. Less sharp edges than the drift wood and lava rocks. Accents the fishes colors in the tank - unless they are black.. then its a hide and go seek game.

 

[peanut]

keepit natural

 

[riggs]

I vote sand.

 

[fishnutham]

I vote sand.

i love sand but in the past find it a pain when moving anthing around in the tank so have converted two tanks back to gravel just easier for me as i like to change things and do heavy vacuums when i clean just my 2 cents ........

 

[aquaking]

I always got my catfish to swim around and kick up debri off the sand. I have no problem scooping most of the waste off the bottom with the old style fish nets. With the very small holes which tend to rip easily. Not the green nets,but the white ones. a long straight cyclinder shaped piece of wood always taped would help on bigger setups.... It just depends what you want and how you will work with it. It's your tank.... set it up how you want!! Just gotta take care of it.... in any case.... keep anything other than a goldfish should enable to you do some research. That's why im here. GO MFK!!!!