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Substrate issues

H

heather

Guest
<font color="ff6000">i have noticed that having no gravel at all resulted in cloudy water,but then gravel had its cons too....I know lots of people use sand but i was wondering how a gravel/sand combination would work.....does anyone have/had this kind of substrate?? how does it work??</font>
 
K

katy

Guest
i use river stones and sand to fill in the gaps and it works really well. i'd personally stay away from small gravel altogether, but it does depend on the eating habits of your axies.
 
H

heather

Guest
they like to eat gravel so i use very large river stones and was thinking about filling the gaps with sand. how does that seem to be working for your tank???

just curious do you have any wormie things in your tank.........see the "worm problem" thread and see what i mean.......
 
M

mik

Guest
suggest gravel and large stones over them. But others do use sand. Have a look at a few setups in one of the other recents threads "pictures of tank set ups" or similar
 
H

heather

Guest
i have decided to get some sand.....katy where did you get your sand??they have stuff at the pet shop but it isnt exactly what im looking for, i was thinking about betting some from a beach and boiling the **** outa it....
 
K

kim

Guest
I have now changed to sand and its alot easier to care for, and no need to worry about them eating it.

Dont take the sand from the beach did you know it illegal? and more than anything its covered in so much c**p its unbelievable.

I got my sand from a pet shop it was called aquarium sand. I have also been told that 0.5mm silca sand is good, and know of someone that used play sand for their tank but of course well soaked and wash about 1000 times!!.

I have had pebbles in my tank but i found that my axos didnt like climbing over them and were unable to sit in a nice spot.

Mine now make little dips in the sand were they like to lay all day untill i get hom from work. :D
 
H

heather

Guest
i pretty sure it isnt illegal where i live and our beaches are pretty clean and i wouldnt get it from a dirty beach any way all the sand they have at pet shops here is purple and stuff....not exactly what im looking for
 
K

kim

Guest
Wow really they take it from the beach?

In england i believe that you are not allowed to take anything off of there e.g sand, pebbles.

I wouldnt personally like to take sand off the beach you say it is clean but think about the amount of rubbish etc has been dumped in the wonderful sea, And the effects it has on the wild life.

If they take play sand from your beach im sure they would pressure treat it... washing is nothing compared to that.

Purple sand sounds good it might show them off a bit more. Try asking around at some firms that provide Silca sand for builders, i think this sand is used for molding some objects... Just like cannon balls many many years ago. It fairly fine and if you find a nice merchant they might give you such a small amount free!
 
J

joseph

Guest
I think purple sand would take away from the natural look of the tank.

For sand, another thing in mind is salt....not to mentiond whatever has been dumped into the sand as mentioned above.


If you want sand...by a bag of it for around 5 bucks.
 
M

mary

Guest
Where did you think sand comes from???? All sand comes from the beach/sea origionally!!! Even silca sand for builders comes from the ocean origionally - but then it is processed. You don't find sand anywhere that an ocean/sea hasn't been - even if it was a million years ago, it was still a beach!!!
 
K

katy

Guest
i got my sand as ' white aquarium sand' from the pet shop. as the others have said, it'd be a bad idea to get sand from the beach. i think you can get good stuff from construction shops, but personally i wouldn't trust anything except what is specifically made for pets!

i did see one little worm thing - it was vaguely a long oval shape and suckered to the glass, but that was before i got the sand, when i had just the river stones. haven't seen any since.
 
K

kim

Guest
lol yeah did think of sand like that.. i thought that the stuff they use in contrction was made by machines.. But Mik might know more about that.

Ive not had problems with worms at all even with sand or gravel. Just snails.. which just keep popping up from time to time.. they get to stay in there while they are small but if they get bigger than 5mm they get put in with the fish.
 
H

heather

Guest
Play sand, construction stuff, even the stuff in bags at stores here was taken directly from the beaches and then just cleaned a little bit and bagged!the beaches here are really clean, i was gonna wash + boil it any way wich is gonna get it more clean than the stuff they sell at the stores!!!! besides the aquarium sand at the pet shop is the wrong color and its like 12$ for a tiny bag wich would barely cover half the tank!
 
K

kim

Guest
well just remember boil the F*** out of it! We dont want anything happening.
 
C

cynthia

Guest
Well it is official my lfs all say they can not get blue sand, so I am thinking of going el natural sand.

Do any of you that use sand use a gravel vacuum to clean it? Is there a problem with the sand being so light that it gets sucked up the tube too?


I use a water python no spill clean and fill (hooks to the sink for vacuuming and filling), it works great for regular fish gravel but I have never had a tank with a sand substrate before.


thanks!
Cynthia
 
R

rodney

Guest
I have just put garnet sand in my aquarium and it goes fine with the gravel vacuum cleaner. There is only very minimal loss. It is also a lot easier to keep clean than gravel
 
C

cynthia

Guest
Thanks Rodney I was worried I would end up "cleaning all the sand from the tank" over time.
happy.gif


-Cynthia
 
C

cynthia

Guest
I am still fighting with myself over sand lol

I was looking at the caribsea black moon sand because it says it can be put in fresh water tanks without raising the ph. Caribsea also has a white sand they have listed for freshwater tanks.

I had read that black sand is too sharp for catfish and damages their barbels(whiskers). So I called the company today to ask them if the carab sea moon sand was "sharp". They said "yes" because it is silca sand and all silca sand is sharp. I asked her about the white sand they sell for fresh water and she said it is softer than the black but it is silca too so it is sharp as well.

Have any of you who are using silca sand had any problems with the axolotls getting damaged from sharp sand?
 
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