advice on changing Substrate in my 30g

[aquaherper]

Atm I have small gravel in my tank and I'm going to replace it with floramax. Question is how should I go about doing this.?? Step by step process?

 

[Ayi]

1) put fish and decor in a bucket of tank water, heater and filter.
2) scoop out all gravel
3) rinse floramax (not too much)
4)put floramax into tank. There should still be water in the tank.
5) fill a few ziplock bag with gravel and poke small holes in them.
6) if it has plants, wait for the particles to settle
7) put everything back into the tank.

 

[aquaherper]

Whats with 5 ?

 

[Ayi]

The bacteria that is on the gravel will spread from the gravel bag to the floramax. I'm not sure if it's necessary but I've always done it.

 

[aquaherper]

I see.
And for vacuming floramax do I have to dig into it like with the rocks or just the surfice.

 

[Ayi]

I would just do the surface.

 

[aquaherper]

New idea. putting topsoil then the fm.
Just to give the sub a lil more depth.
Sound good? Or no?

 

[Mebbid]

I would skip adding soil in the tank. It's really more of an advanced method for tanks and isn't necessary. The floramax will be fine all on its own. Also, unless you are currently running an under gravel filter then keeping gravel in the tank should be unnecessary. However if you are running a ugf then that will be absolutely necessary.

 

[Rokuzachi]

Wouldn't worry about adding the old gravel in for bacteria. They're sessile so having water drain off of your old gravel and into the tank will not do much. Your filter should have most of your bac anyways, unless you aren't running a filter.

When I substrate change I drain the tank down to 10%, use a perforated scooping device to remove it, suck out the last of the dirty water and then add the new stuff and set the tank back up. It's pretty hard to go wrong with the tank itself, just make sure the fish and filter are taken care of.

 

[aquaherper]

Is a 12lb bag gonna cover 3 sq feet deep enuff I want a nice thick sub. But don't really wanna buy 2 bags. Looking for a filler or an under layer

 

[Mebbid]

It most likely wont. What size tank is this?

 

[aquaherper]

30g
36/12/18

 

[Mebbid]

You are going to need approx 30lbs to have a 2" depth on your substrate.

The Planted Tank


The price really is a big issue with planted substrates. It's the only reason my 55g has black diamond blasting sand rather than eco complete.

 

[aquaherper]

So what issues would I be dealing with if I botttomed w/ soil?

 

[Mebbid]

if you have diggers there can be potential clouding of the tank, mixing of the substrates, possible leaching of nutrients into the water.

I don't think a 12lb bag will be a sufficient amount to cap the soil either but I'm not terribly familiar with dirted tanks so you will have to ask someone that has experience with them.

 

[aquaherper]

True I didn't think about having enuff to sufficiently cap

 

[Mebbid]

If you really wanted to do dirted you could return the substrate you got and go buy a bag of pool filter sand. Can get that stuff very cheaply.

 

[aquaherper]

I haven't bought it yet. N I was wanting to shy away srom sand.. but it would be a hole lot cheaper

 

[Mebbid]

I find that sand is quite a bit easier to plant in than the coarser substrates, it's also a lot easier to keep clean. I'm using black diamond blasting sand in my planted 55g and flourite in my planted 10g. Working with plants is a major chore with the flourite.

Why don't you like sand?

 

[aquaherper]

Well I set up my 7g with strait filter sand.
Came out nice I sapose. Wanted to play with this one before breaking down my 30g.
So plants with out an already established root system are pretty vulnerable to being dug up it seems not much is holding them in place.