How many lbs. of gravel?
- Thread starter PredatorFish
- Start date
I deffinatly don't want to use a UGF with my Mbunas. I have a python. What type of sand is the best to use? I want it to be fairly large grained so it doesn't make the water real cloudy if it gets stirred up. Does that Carib Sea sand work well?
A friend of mine uses sand blasting sand from Home Depot. It looks really good. Sand blasting sand comes in varieties of sizes. From vary fine to larger grains. It would be up to you to find the exact granular you want.
Another advantage of this is that you'll pay A LOT less than ordering online or buying it from a LFS.
Couldn't argue with you there. Also, you can't do much terrascaping or decoration adding with UGF's. It seems that they can cause dead spots and short circuits. Oh well, nothing is perfect.
Just a note: no matter which sand you choose, make sure to rinse it very well before adding it to your tank, it will really help in not making your water too cloudy! There will be some initial cloudiness when you fill the tank with water, but if you've done a good job choosing your sand and rinsing it well, it should disappear within an hour or so.
You can either rinse sand by putting it in a pillowcase and running water over (the fine grains go through the material) or just putting it all in a bucket and filling the bucket with water until the water you pour out is clear. I've used both methods with a good deal of success, although I liked the bucket method better (I was able to stir the sand while I rinsed and I didn't ruin a pillowcase
).
HTH!
You can either rinse sand by putting it in a pillowcase and running water over (the fine grains go through the material) or just putting it all in a bucket and filling the bucket with water until the water you pour out is clear. I've used both methods with a good deal of success, although I liked the bucket method better (I was able to stir the sand while I rinsed and I didn't ruin a pillowcase
). HTH!
UGFs are not the best filters when raising cichlids. That is just a fact. Especially large cichlids. Many like to dig and it negates the effectiveness of the UGF. If you use sand, I just try to suck up the visual waste. Every so often I mix the sand around a lot to get it suspended in the tank's water. Then I siphon and let my external filters suck the junk out.
Instead of rinsing the sand, try putting the sand in first, the slowly adding the water by pouring it into a plate so it floods the sand without stirring it up. We've used this method on 3 SW tanks, and 3 FW tanks without any clouding at all. You want to keep the variety of particles, including the little bitty ones. The small grain sizes provide a huge amount of surface area for bacteria to colonize.
And, wetmanNY's advice sounds about right. We used about 75 lb's of sand for the 3 SW tanks. Each one had 5-6 inches of sand, and is 18" X 36". (No, you don't want that much sand in a FW tank, but it's perfect for SW!)
And, wetmanNY's advice sounds about right. We used about 75 lb's of sand for the 3 SW tanks. Each one had 5-6 inches of sand, and is 18" X 36". (No, you don't want that much sand in a FW tank, but it's perfect for SW!)
I went to Lowes (similar to Home Depot) and bought commercial grade, medium Sand bye Quickcrete. It's 100% silica sand (safe for fish) and the medium size ranges from about 1mm to 3mm. It's a very uniform light tan/brown. I rinsed this stuff in a bucket three times and the water was very clear afterwards. When added to my aquarium it didn't cloud at all and immediately sinks to bottom. Not a bit of floating/suspended garbage! I am really happy with this sand and will suggest it to anyone interested. It's in a concrete mix looking thick paper sack. It's exactly the same makeup as playsand, just it was a larger size. The playsand is very dusty/dirty from what I've heard numerous times, and when I looked in the bag it was very fine grained. Try the Quickcrete medium sand. It's for all types of general use (sandbox, concrete foundation, leveling, commercial use, etc.)
Sandblasting sand is 100% silica and comes in different size grades, depending on what you are looking for.
