Carib sea red substrate

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corygirl50

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Oct 3, 2015
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Hello- I'm setting up a new 29 gal and am starting the cycle. My LFS suggested the eco system substrate since I'm starting the new cycle. Me? Oh yea try something new and good for the plants. Relative newbie to the hobby only about a year now.

I'm not able to get the water settled it has cleared somewhat but hasn't settled. Its been 1 week and each time i touch anything it goes swamp.

Any suggestions/ comments on the time frame or what I can expect will be appreciated.
 
Was it the eco complete? Basically if you don't rinse the bejeezus out of it you will have cloudy water. I know you're not supposed to rinse it according to the package, but you're gonna end up with cloudiness if you don't. Eventually with water changes and filtration it will start to clear up. But it can take a long time.
 
Yes eco complete and no I didn't rinse it. I thought it would take all the nutrients put. Plus bag says no rinse.

Thank you! Early enough in cycle I'll rinse it throughly tonight. Can't even check perams with the mud color! Thank you again
 
I have the EcoComplete in 2 tanks, but the black not the red... I didn't rinse it either time, and didn't get cloudy water.

I don't think I did anything special, just filled slowly and maybe diffused with hardscape or plant.

Not sure what the problem might be.. but you should be fine rinsing if needed, just be sure to keep your filter running in a tank somewhere, or the media wet in tank water.
 
I didn't have to rinse my black Eco either, just the red. I really don't know what's different about it that I had to rinse it.
 
Sorry for possible stupid question but seems like I'll just have gravel substrate again.
Are the hard pieces the nutrient value?

I had a plant in there hard and the silt rested on the leaves and burned several. I took it out and rinsed in my other tanks change water and put it in my other tank.

The malaysian driftwwod won't stay sunk. The only thing that will stay sunk is my bag of gravel medium from the other tank. So far not too happy with my choice.

And I have a filter running and I've rinsed the filters in my other tank change water twice.
 
*looks confused*

In my black Eco... the only pieces were hard, I did have Floramax in another tank, that was red, and really needed to be rinsed (or filled really slowly)

If the Eco is the same, it should all be the same stuff,

As for the driftwood, hold it down with a couple of decent sized rocks until it stays down by itself.. it needs to be waterlogged to stay sunk.

to get rid of fine particle matter in the water column, you can just add filter floss (Or aquarium safe quilt batting) to your filter, and just toss it and replace until your water is fine too.


Relax and take a deep breath, nothing happens right away, it will all come together soon.


And what sort of plants are you trying to grow?
 
I'm confused too thus the silly question.

I had a large sword to start with and was planning the layout.

I thought the cloudiness was the "dirt" to fortify the plants. I did have the water in the tank when I poured the bag in - 30 dollar mistake...

I started with one bag and was going to add more as the cycle was going and money allowed.

I'm hoping to get some sort of carpet plant for a portion of the tank and then find some unique plants as I go. And also have to upgrade lighting.

Still learning- I've had my 16 gal stable and thriving for 7 months now so I wanted to give my bottom dwellers a little bigger footprint with the bigger home.
 
Probably, what I would do personally, assuming there are no fish in the tank, would be to drain the tank totally, wipe down the inside walls of the tank and the decor where possible, then fill incredibly slowly, onto something like a plate, so stop any water directly hitting the substrate,

If you make sure the water is really slow, i.e. barely more than dripping in there, it won't bring up any of the fine powder or whatever it is from the substrate, so the water will be clean.

Have the return from the filter be as slow as possible, again for now, to stop the water hitting the substrate as much as possible, and given time you should work up a bit of biofilm on the substrate, which should stop the water getting cloudy.

You will likely want to do any planting and placing of wood (again, use a rock or 2 for now to get it to sink) before filling.


and remember, as slowly as possible :)
 
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