Sand depth for African Cichlids

[kometus]

Just wondering what the ideal depth of sand is for a cichlid tank. Im using tahitian moon black sand. Thanks!

 

[Coler]

An inch to an inch and a half is absolutely plenty. Any more than that is a nitrate bed and will have a greater risk of developing pockets of anerobic bacteria which may leak toxic gases.

Make sure your rocks are bedded down well in it; they'll burrow like badgers.

 

[jm1212]

1½ should be fine; they like to move it around the tank and rearrange, so if there isnt enough they wont be able to make sufficient "caves" under the rock.

 

[Coler]

You want the rocks to be effectively on the tank with the gravel bedded around them, not on any depth of gravel whatsoever, so they they can't tunnel under and cause a landslide (They will dig away at little nooks and crannies in the side quite a bit but you don't want them to get underneath).

Check out this thread for a time lapse of mbuna digging http://www.aquariacentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=116769&highlight=time+lapse

You don't want the substrate anything like that deep - the footage was done for demonstration/a bit of fun