alright. i cant stand it. im done with sand.

[bobsaget]

got some silica sand from a local company. 100 pound bag for like 25 bucks. it looked good at first, but for months now ive just been staring at nasty green patches of algae, all over the place. it looks messy, and ugly. even if i were to do a "blackout" for a week, im sure it'd come right back. and i do tons of WC, so i know things arent just sitting there. i found a natural looking gravel i like from a LFS and want to switch.

what is the absolute best way to do this? its a 30g tank, and theres only two rams

 

[Glabe]

You can just siphon out the sand and dump in gravel. If you aren't sure if it will get cloudy from gravel, you should remove the fish, but you may not have to

 

[Glabe]

And cories might help with the algae from getting bad since they always groom the sand

 

[bobsaget]

well it'd be a LOT of sand to siphon. i have like 3-4 inches. and i only have 2 2.5g pails to work with. im sure cories would help. but i go thru the sand and agitate it all the time, and it doesnt seem to do much.

 

[FreshyFresh]

I've heard of a few tankaholics wanting out of the sand the past few weeks.. Either it wasn't eye-appealing to them in the long run or they kept fish that stirred it up constantly causing filtration issues. It's one of those things where you don't know until you try it with your setup.

Same goes with the marble chips I have in my 55g. HATE it now, but my wisteria and water sprite are rooted so nicely in it, I hate to disturb them.

 

[bobsaget]

what if i take out all the deco, and fish. then i take out like 80 percent of the water, and just scoop up the sand by hand/bowl and then fill the tank back up, then put everything back? will i be creating a new bacteria-bloom?

 

[ktrom13]

I had sand in my 10 gallon before i switched over to Floramax. The only reason i got rid of it was because i used 2 different colors of sand ( had black sand and whitish sand) and i wanted to make that river effect with it but it just mixed. The mistake was on my part. I didnt use any type of dividers to keep the sand from mixing

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[FreshyFresh]

ktrom, how do you like the floramax in your 10g? I set my 10g up with it as well, back in Jan/Feb. I like the color of it (brown), but it dusts like crazy if you have to move anything around or during water changes. I don't notice any difference with my plants between using Floramax or ordinary gravel, but I only have the plants listed in my sig.

I dose API liquid CO2 and API leaf zone.

 

[platytudes]

It sounds like you have Cyanobacteria, not algae. Maracyn is one way to "treat" it but you have to figure out what the root cause is. Does it smell musty? It has a very distinctive smell. I am almost positive that is what you have though, and if you can manually remove it and do big water changes, along with encourage fast growing plants, I think you will beat it...I know I have (and fortunately have never had to resort to dosing Maracyn)

 

[ktrom13]

ktrom, how do you like the floramax in your 10g? I set my 10g up with it as well, back in Jan/Feb. I like the color of it (brown), but it dusts like crazy if you have to move anything around or during water changes. I don't notice any difference with my plants between using Floramax or ordinary gravel, but I only have the plants listed in my sig.

I dose API liquid CO2 and API leaf zone.

I like it so far. It does seem to be messier than the gravel in my other tanks. I try to avoid moving anything around in it because of the "dust" youre talking about. To avoid messy water changes i turn off the filter and our the water back in very slowly. I dont notice much of a difference between it and gravel. I only dose API liquid CO2 as well and all my plants are doing very well.

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