making the switch from sand to pea gravel

[sixftsam]

I recently switched over from gravel to sand, but lets not go into the whole pro and con aspect of sand here. One bit of advice i heard when switching was that its important not to remove all of the substrate in one go. Beneficial bacteria are present on the substrate as well as in the filter etc, so its important for the transition to be smooth, especially in tanks where there may be overstocking issues already.
My advice to you would be change out some of the sand now, perhaps 50%, and then leave the tank half and half for 10 days or so. This way the pea gravel would have a chance to pick up the good bacteria. Then after 10 days, take out the remaining sand, youll lose a tiny bit of gravel along the join too to tidy things up, then mix the gravel you have already in there with the new gravel you add, and you have happy good bacteria everywhere, and no ammonia or nitrate spikes!
Hope it helps a little, just what i did and seemed to work a treat.

 

[twhittle]

pool filter sand is too expensive... plus its too "white" for my taste

Pool filter sand is cheap, less than $8 for a 50 lb bag. It also comes in a variety of colors from dark to light, depending on where it comes from. I just switched from gravel to PFS and couldn't be happier.

 

[twhittle]

Removing all the substrate at once is fine. If you get an ammonia or nitrate spike because of substrate, your tank isn't fully cycled. While small amounts of bacteria are in the gravel, it is not enough to cause spikes unless you are drastically underfiltered.

 

[djlancer88]

..

sorry i didnt know your situation.

But thats sucks!