driftwood?

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onah

Aquarium Advice Freak
Joined
Aug 29, 2006
Messages
304
Location
laredo,tx.
i was noticing all the driftwood places just find theres in a lake or river spray the heck out of it and sell it. does this mean i can go down to my local lake and fish out a few peices and blast them off and let them dry and toss them into the tank?
 
I'm not so sure onah but then again i live in the UK so i have no idea as to what the driftwood is like. Personally i perhaps wouldn't but if you steralise the wood then drain any colour out of it by dumping it in a bucket of water for a few days (change the water daily) then it will probably be ok. Steralisation would surely be the key though, i'm no expert but that is what i would do if i wanted to use some.

HTH
 
If it is truly driftwood, you could get it from local bodies of water. I'd be sure to clean it well and either bake or boil it before putting it in your tank. Also, make sure you know the place you are getting it from isn't contaminated in any way.
 
i just set up a new tank and put some found drift wood in.

i boiled it for about 40 minutes and then soaked it for a couple days. i tested the water it sat in and everything checked out.

when i put the tank together, i put rocks on top of it to hold it under the water.
 
I would definately boil it to kill any hitchhikers that are on or in the wood. I did this with beach drift wood and it has worked really well. My BN love it and so do the otos. I did boil it like 15 times to get it sink because I let it dry out. Always better safe than sorry.
 
Be careful when collecting driftwood. You kind of have to know what you are doing and what kind of wood it is that you've found. You want hard wood. You don't want to put anything like pine in your tank as it will ooze and what not. You also have to know that the place your collecting the wood from isn't polluted otherwise you might introduce toxins that even boiling didn't get rid of.

Personally I prefer to buy African driftwood. It's expensive but it sinks like a rock the minute you put it in water. It can be very hard to get other types of wood to sink and many end up resorting to attaching the wood to a base in order to keep it down.
 
Driftwood's supposed to have been tossed around long enough that it's actually dead (so hopefully less likely to leach out sap etc.) and also somewhat preserved so it's less likely to rot in your tank. :)

The pieces I did, I scrubbed and boiled, then soaked with a weight to hold them down. Took about a week or two until they actually sunk. (Of course I then decided I didn't like the look as much and didn't use them) :roll:

The big things with found driftwood are sterilizing (boiling is probably safer...having it catch fire while you're trying to bake it wouldn't be fun) and for some people, removing the tannins (what turns your water yellow). That part you don't actually have to do if you're impatient and don't mind your water being discolored.
 
well tahnx alot i think i have some pecies around here that will work time to strat checking!
 
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