Plants and driftwood, or Bare Bottom?

[AttackFish]

What do you have for your cats? I'm planning on getting a gulper soon and cannot decide wether to do barebottom for ease of cleaning, or do a really nice planted set up with some low light plants like java fern and elodea.
I was also thinking of just doing substrate such as large river rocks and nothing else for swim space.

Also, if you have pics of your set-up post em up!

 

[kntrygrl4lyfe]

Ive never had a gulper but with my cats I usually do sand, and driftwood. Also some plants here or there.

Usually with sand the all the extra food and stuff stays right on the top and its really easy to clean IMO. Alot easier then rocks and what not

 

[AttackFish]

Cool, I really want to do sand but neither of my LFS sell it. Well, one does sell live sand lol.

Still a hard decision. Do I want to do a bare bottom that displays the fish, or do I want to do a display tank with a monster fish.

Plus, if I do barebottom I'm going to need to paint the bottom, and I dont really feel like taking the tank from upstairs down the stairs and into the garage to paint it.

Were would be a good place to get aquarium safe sand? Lots of landscaping companies in the area I might give them a call.

I've never done sand though and am worried about it getting stirred up and sucked into the filter. I have my intake tube about 1-2'' off the substrate.

 

[holmes14]

you can buy the pure white play sand, or it sounds like your best bet would be some pool filter sand but i used the white play sand and im very happy with it. I just cleaned it out good and my water wasnt even one bit cloudy. Its not bad at all to clean, my filter is the same way yours is.. you have to be carefull and keep a eye on your filter but its really not to much of a concerne just dont stir up the sand to much around the filter.

 

[kntrygrl4lyfe]

Its alwasy nice to look at a great setup with an awesome fish in it. That sucks that your fish stores dont sell it. Mine didnt and I asked them to order the fine white sand and they did.

 

[AttackFish]

I'm going to go to home depot next weekend and see what they have all the different types of stones and whatnot. I like the lookd of large rounded river stones placed together but I might do sand if I can get a good price on it.

As far as filtration is a 30''x16''x24'' tank and I'm using an Aquaclear 110 and picking up a powerhead soon for extra current, or is what I have adequate? I do 50% wc each sunday.

 

[kntrygrl4lyfe]

I think 20-30% water change each week would be enough.

 

[killerfish]

may need a bigger tank they will get around 8'' or bigger

they would like some small pieces of driftwood and plants go with some sand i would attatch plants to the drift wood and have a thin layer of sand that way its still eazy to clean if you don't suck the sand up when cleaning also add some floating plants if you can't find a light balb thats pretty dim

hope you know these fish cost around $500

 

[AttackFish]

may need a bigger tank they will get around 8'' or bigger

they would like some small pieces of driftwood and plants go with some sand i would attatch plants to the drift wood and have a thin layer of sand that way its still eazy to clean if you don't suck the sand up when cleaning also add some floating plants if you can't find a light balb thats pretty dim

hope you know these fish cost around $500

These fish grow very slow, and dont move around a whole lot so I should be able to house it in this tank for quite sometime.
And as far as price go's, I've found 4'' for $75.

And for plants, I'm going to have some elodea floating at the top and java fern along the back and sides of the tank.

I think 20-30% water change each week would be enough.

Thanks

 

[parker21104]

check out petsmart i bought some black hatian sand from them and thats what I use in my 240 with my wallago along with driftwood just be cautious of rocks or wood that in case you spook your catfish. My wallago has marked himself up from time to time on the driftwood.