cheep aquarium gravel

[nsamuel]

Home Depot garden center. They have paver sand, pea gravel, river rocks, and pond rocks. I just bought another 5 bags $21 total. In my festae pair's tank, I used 1 bag of sand, 1 bag of pea gravel, and 1 bag of pond rocks. They love it. Just be sure to rinse all of them until the water runs clear. There's a lot of dust that will milk up your water. I've been using these in my 210 for several months now with no problems.

nolapete,
The pea gravel pebbles that you use .....what is their size in mm ?
Have you tested your water to see how much they affect ph/kh/gh ?

Have any of you guys looked into the "black criva" pebbles from Lowes ? They are about 4 mm size average. I tested it with vinegar (after removing the obviously white calcerous material). I hear a hizzing from it and was wondering how much ph/kh/gh change would come about. Its always a risk, as some of these stones might leach chemicals/minerals.

Do you guys bother to test any of these before you use them ? I would like to hear from some people who have used these for over 6 months what kind of effect they had on their water.