lbirath001
Aquarium Advice Freak
- Joined
- Jun 18, 2013
- Messages
- 299
I also have both gravel in my daughters 20g and sand in my 70. Sand is great for many things so is gravel.
My questions are
What is your stock?
Planted?
I'm not too familiar with the reedfish, were you thinking about adding some new fish?
I agree with cichlids preferring sand. Same thing goes for most bottom dwellers
If you're deciding on sand I can give you some great tips to make the conversion easier. But for sure it is some work but once done I think I will be worth it. Also with sand you might think of putting in an easy to care for live plant.
I'm a huge fan of sand. Though, gravel has it's pros as well. I have sand in my aquarium. If you can get pool filter sand, it's really cheap. I got a bag of 50lbs for like 11 dollars from Ace Hardware. Some places have it cheaper, but I had to order and pick up through Ace because apparently the Oregon Coast isn't a big seller on pool supplies! Haha.
Don't get super fine, and make sure to wash out the sand. You'll get some clouding for awhile even when you rinse it for quite awhile though. Once it clears, it looks fantastic! Easy to clean, just don't siphon right at the sand, hover above it by a few inches. You will suck some up inevitably, but nothing that won't be cheap to replace later.
Gravels easier to clean, but it seems gross faster to me. Maybe the sands texture hides it better? That and no matter how much you clean gravel, when you take it out, you'll see grossness all over the bottom of your tank. Sand doesn't have crevices leading to the bottom.
Live plants are great. They add oxygen to the water, they can be nibbled on if you miss a feeding time for any reason, and they just look fantastic.
Help help help!!! I'm removing the gravel and there is all kinds of floating garbage in here. Should I do a complete water change or try to net it all out?
Did you already remove the fish? If so how much water did you put them in? I'm not sure if it is possible to net out the garbage. If you have at least 25% if your original water with the fish I would just use that and empty the rest
That's perfect I would totally empty the tank then and just use fresh treated water and the water your fish currently are in. You should be good as long as you match the temperature as close as possible. So not only will you change the substrate you'll also get a 66-70% pwc
Post pics when you're done I'm curious how it all turned out