3M Color Quartz substrate

There is an alternative. At your local fish store, you'll probably find something called tahitian black moon sand. Stuff isnt as black, but still makes a great substrate. I just advise you not to use it with cories and other bottom dwelling fish.
 
ooo..... i'm glad you told me. i did see it at the store and was tempted. but i do have plecos and cories! thanks for the info!
 
If you can't drive to there, call & see how much it would be to ship to your home.
 
Black Sand

I picked up some of the black 3m colorquartz. I have both the S grade and the T grade. I would definitely recommend the T grade though for your tank. The S grade is like talcum powder and easily sifts up into my filters. So I have to turn off my filters if I do ANYTHING with my tank. With the T grade, I can move plants around and do light cleaning and it seems to be heavy enough to settle quickly without getting caught in the filter.

Anyway, this is a few pictures of my planted tank just after putting in the black T Grade 3m colorquartz and also just putting all the plants in. It will give you an idea of how it looks. I know the brown coloring of the tank isnt the best, but I was going to try to change that. This is a 55 gallon tank, freshly planted. That is why the water is a little cloudy.

blacksand.jpg blacksand2.jpg blacksand3.jpg blacksand4.jpg
 
Actually LG, that is a myth. I have been using that moon sand with my cory cats and pleco, snails, and otos, they all love that sfuff. The cory cats love digging in it as if it were the regular sand, and no ill effects. Although, word of caution, the stuff is EXTREMELY dusty, I still manage to kick up dust when I plant things. Looks great though :)
 
I have been following another thread on the Color Quartz and, after using both S size and T size granuals, they recommedned T.
 
Echo, Considering your post in the catfish and bottom dweller forum, I'm thinking you have something else wrong. Missing barbels are usually a sign of some sort of infection, can often happen with gravel that is not kept in the best of shape. As it stands, its been a couple of months or so since I got the moon sand, and all my cory cats still have their barbels.
 
Cory Keeper said:
Echo, Considering your post in the catfish and bottom dweller forum, I'm thinking you have something else wrong. Missing barbels are usually a sign of some sort of infection, can often happen with gravel that is not kept in the best of shape. As it stands, its been a couple of months or so since I got the moon sand, and all my cory cats still have their barbels.
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The only time I ever had corys with missing barbels was the period in which I was using the moon sand. You do have a valid point in that I can't keep corys alive for too long, but none of my cory carcasses were barbel-less except those that lived on moon sand. Ergo my conclusion is that moon sand isn't good for corys. Carib Sea's website indicates it's not soft belly safe. (If it's not safe for soft bellies, doesn't that indicate a slight possibility of not being cory safe?) And other people who have had success with corys also indicate issues with the moon sand as well.

So yes...good point that I am no cory expert. But still I feel reticent to suggest anyone with corys use the stuff so long as my experience and others' experience has shown some chance of it being unsafe. For example I keep bettas and gouramis in one tank. I have been for many years in a careful manner and have been successful without incident. But still I would hesitate to recommend anyone else try it.

Hope you get what I'm saying.

But yeah...I suck at cory keeping!:grinyes:
 
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