Adding to existing substrate...

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Haileyjade

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Jan 18, 2014
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Wisconsin
My sister had gifted me a ten gallon aquarium for Christmas a couple of years ago, including a few bags of blue gravel with the intent to match the decor in my house. I would have preferred something natural, but not wanting to offend her, I set the tank up using the blue.

Fast forward, now I've got a 20 and want to use the ten for trying out different plants. I'm going to upgrade the stock lighting in hopes of having more options available, but I question the substrate. I don't want to give up the gravel (my sister spends a lot of time here and I still really don't want to offend her), but I know it's not great for growing plants. There's about 5 million MTS in there as well.

If I buy some flourite, would it be okay to cap it with the gravel? I'm hoping to tackle this project over the weekend as I'm having carpal tunnel surgery Monday and it'll be a while before I'm able to get at it of I put it off. Any advice would be greatly appreciated!




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Yeah it'd be fine. Honestly you could probably get away with just the gravel, either way just supplement with root tabs.


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Do you think so? I have some low light plants in there now, but when I tried Wisteria they didn't thrive at all. From when I'd read before I purchased it they didn't require high lighting, and the tank does get quite a bit of natural light so I just figured the gravel wasn't working with the root tabs. Ah well, I'll get over this plant learning curve eventually. Thanks!


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Just my opinion. I'd say, if you can, find a polite way to get out of the colored gravel now. It's easier to start off on the right foot then trying to swap substrate after the fact. Maybe you can utilize the blue gravel in another project to not offend her? I think once you've made a decision to go live plants, nothing beats natural all the way.
 
I think you two might be on to something...a quick glance at Pinterest terrariums and now I'm all fired up to repurpose this blue gravel! It's going to be a long few weeks waiting to get the use of my hand back. I'll probably pick through it this weekend as best I can to remove the snails, but save the fun stuff for when I'm 100%. Thanks guys!


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