changing substrate

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PartyAnimal1UK

just an english girl at heart
Dec 11, 2001
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At the moment i have bright coloured substrate orange green and puple which i know sounds gross but i think it looks quite nice, anyway the substate has been in the tank for just over a year know and the colour is starting to peel of, i obviuosly need to change it as it looks horrible, i have a few questions about this

a) is this toxic

b) how do i change the substrate over just empty the tank change the gravel and place back everything even the water un cleaned

c) What colour should i go for that isn't going to do this again, i don't like white and i do like the bright colours but how i can i be sure they won't peel again, and really that doesen't show algae, from the light.

AND

d) does anyone have black substarte in there tank, coz i do like it and i use to have it in a smaller tank but i don't know wether it would look too darker in a big tank, plus it's expensive.


Sorry there's a lot just need to get some answers thanks in advance.:) :)
 
I have black sand in my 120 gal. The only thing is that the black sand draws alot of light out of the tank. I am running 160 watts of light in it and it looks dark, but the one plant and sand stone i have in there just glows. The color of the fish realy stands out very well.
 
Originally posted by PartyAnimal1UK

b) how do i change the substrate over just empty the tank change the gravel and place back everything even the water un cleaned
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From what I understand, that might be a BAD idea. Since some of the bacteria vital to your tank's biosystem live in the gravel, it would probably be better to remove/replace sections (maybe 20%) of your substrate during water changes until the whole thing is done. That way you wouldn't be removing too many bacteria at one time, and would be giving bacteria time to get settled in a new section of substrate before adding another.
 
I'd scoop it out with a tupperware container and replace it with onyx sand or gravel. What kind of fish do you have in the tank?
 
Sensei has a point. The gravel holds a lot of beneficial bacteria necessary for the tank. I successfully changed my gravel last year (dark blue and black mixture to natural pebble colored).

Scoop all the colored gravel out of 1/2 of the tank and put into a nylon stocking (rinse stocking in hot water first). Rinse your new gravel really well, then put into the empty space. Put the nylon stocking in the back end of the tank and leave it alone. In 2 weeks, do the same thing on the other side of the tank (leaving the other stocking in the tank).

Once the new gravel has been in the tank for a month, remove the first gravel stocking you made - throw it away. 2 weeks later remove the second one and throw it away. Now I don't know if it's necessary to leave the stockings in the tank for a month, but I figured that since my tests came up OK it wasn't doing any harm.

Your tank will look odd while you have the stockings in there, but maybe you could hide them with decorations? I have a 2 artifical caves and i just put the stockings behind them - you could only really see them if you were standing right in front of the tank.

As for the peeling color being toxic - doubtful as long as you used "official" aquarium quality gravel.

Color - well I like the looks of my natural colored gravel. Black is also nice, but tends to make your tank look dark unless you have tons of lighting. My old gravel was nice, I just wanted a change in my tank. Depending on if you have live plants or not, you could do something different, like river rocks I think they're called - bigger rocks instead of the tiny gravel. Nice effect, I have them in my Eclipse 3 betta condo! :D
 
dwayne (the girl not the fish :p ) has a good method of swapping out the gravel.
I like the solid (not mixed) darker colors - black, blue, green. I use dark green in my tank (I'd show you if I ever get off my butt to post them!!). I think the fish stand out better if the gravel is a consistent color. The lfs has a set up with blue and green mixed that looks pretty good though.
Then there is that site that might have something informative on it...what was it...oh yeah, skeptical something or other. :D
 
Ye i did have a look tended to stcik to the natural colours though which i ain't too keen on, i might go have a peak at my lfs see what they have in stock any more ideas.
 
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