bigger rocks over gravel??

hey,
im about to get an axie in about a week (got the tank today) and i put gravel in the bottom, not relising that axies can swallow it. would it be ok to put a whole lot of bigger rocks on top or would i have to take out the gravel and put in the big rocks by themselves?

Are you able to wait several weeks before getting your axie so you can cycle your tank? see: http://www.caudata.org/cc/articles/cyclingEDK.shtml

I would advise removing the gravel completely and using either bare substrate or sand (another alternative with gravel or sand is found at fllwg thread posted by Jennewt: http://www.caudata.org/forum/messages/793/77098.html?1170154180).

Putting rocks over gravel has been used before with an undergravel filter. This can lead to water quality problems if you are both new to setting up tanks and don't keep up with regular tankwater testing and maintenance (cleaning). Waste also tends to build up beneath and UG filter plate , see: www.caudata.org/forum/showthread.php?t=48132

How you feed (handfeeding/dropping it in/skewer/tongs/tweezers) and type of food can also cause problems with water quality. If you just drop the food in and it's live, it may crawl into the substrate, or fall between the rocks (pellets/frozen bloodworm) and be hard to retrieve when cleaning. Handfeeding doesn't always guarantee they won't attempt to burrow beneath any sort of substrate, ours does it in sand, a friend uses river rocks and have seen their axies shift the river rocks with their mouths/heads in the efforts to get what they think is trapped food beneath. If your one did that chances are it could get to the layer of gravel beneath.

I really wouldn't do that. It stops the axi from eating the gravel but it is impossible to clean. I did it my self and when I changed to sand my tank was a mess underneath everything!

ok, ill do that, thannks for the advice

i took out the small gravel and put in larger rocks. i now have an axie called mambo and im glad that i took out the gravel before he had the oppurtunity to swallow it, thanks heaps for the advice!

Kia ora Chrissy,

Any photos of mambo?