Who here has sand for substrate?
- Thread starter PoopSmart
- Start date
I got coral sand in one of my tanks. I put an inch and a half layer on top of an inch of fine gravel and used an undergravel filter. You can see through the glass that the top half inch of sand is clean after 2 years. I keep half a dozen corys in there to keep the substrate neat. I wouldn't recommend corys with the cichlids though.
I use sand in my Mbuna tank. It is play sand from Home Depot to be exact. My filters keep debris off my sand, and my Mbunas keep any extra food off of it. You have to stir it at least every 3 months or else there will be a chance of anaerobic bacteria build up which isn't good for the fish. Maybe these links will shed some light.
http://www.cichlid-forum.com/videos/cleaning_sand.php
http://www.cichlid-forum.com/articles/sand.php
Daniel
http://www.cichlid-forum.com/videos/cleaning_sand.php
http://www.cichlid-forum.com/articles/sand.php
Daniel
Make yourself an account on the forum, and look around the website. They have TONS of info on every cichlid imaginable.
Daniel
Daniel
yeah i havae the pure white play sand, and i vacuum it as often as i would gravel. Maybe even more cause i can see alll the **** sittin on top but i do it just like the guy in that vid
I vac my estes marine sand just like gravel. I put the vac straight down in it and it sucks a bunch in the 2' long tube, then I tip it to the side a little bit and the water can get through more easily. It fluidizes the sand and gets all of the crap out. I see a ton of it come out.
I used to have 3600gph going through my 180g... even that much water movement didn't make a bit of difference on how much crap stayed at the bottom. Fish that sift sand may keep uneated food from sitting around, but in a 30" tall tank without a few filter intakes right down by the sand, crap isn't going to come out. And with the filter intake right by the sand you run an increased risk of a broken filter.
I used to have 3600gph going through my 180g... even that much water movement didn't make a bit of difference on how much crap stayed at the bottom. Fish that sift sand may keep uneated food from sitting around, but in a 30" tall tank without a few filter intakes right down by the sand, crap isn't going to come out. And with the filter intake right by the sand you run an increased risk of a broken filter.
I use 2 things to clean my sand. The bottom one is the main one for doing normal w/c's just a 10m length of ehiem 16mm hose with a eheim tap for closing the water off, a eheim 16-12mm reducer to accept a 12mm rigid plastic pipe for hoovering up the crap. The top one is what i use mainly on my discus tank for hooving crap up between w/c's. handle with a cotton bag for catching the crap rigid tube and an airline which allows theair to push the water and crap up the pipe which them collects in the bag but the water to return to the tank. Its my own interpritation of those small one s you get for small tanks, works well too.
