Sand and cleaning question

Cross127 · Aug 17, 2007

bukster;1067918; said:
how hard is the sand to clean if u have, like say, cichlids that are going to
stir up the sand a lot and turn it over the waste and things. is it a huge pain in the neck to clean all the way through the sand?

Most likely the poop will not get burried because it wil just flow away because of the current so really no worries there. It's really not a pain at all IMO to have to clean sand. I think it's alot better than gravel and looks better as well. With gravel you have to stick the syphon hose all the way in it and you and you still will never get all of the poo. Even if the poo does get covered by the digging cichlids it's really not alot at all compared to gravel.

bukster · Aug 17, 2007

k...thanks a lot cross

Rakie · Aug 17, 2007

fishdance;1067553; said:
There is an easier way. Scoop up some water in your gravel cleaner and then hold it up to let water flow down. Before it totally empties, stick it back under water again and the initial draining water will suck the air through creating the siphon you want. Its an easy thing to learn and much faster than putting all your hose underwater.

Yup yup, i like my method because the hose on my siphon are short, but I hate tall tanks

ColemanFish · Aug 18, 2007

Well I went ahead and made the change today to sand. That was alot of work. There was about 3 inches of gravel and it was gross. I thought I was getting my gravel pretty clean with frequent changes and such, but I guess I couldn't get it all. I wanted to keep the fish in but after about 2 scoops it was apparent there was no way. :irked:

Draining a tank is a *****, sooooooooooooooooooo now I have an ammonia problem. The water was probably half tap and half old water. (the fish were in a cooler filled with tank water) Sigh. Apparently our tap is about 1ppm. Tank is testing at .5ppm ........