Ultimate Substrate

[RyanGSP]

Okay i have read posts on what is working and what isnt but what do you find is the best substrate to use.I mean the best from plant, and root growth also shoudl i add fetilizer. I am placin the plats in clay pots (this idea has been posted in this section. So what should i use??

[Don_Lee]

I always say Seachem Flourite or Onyx, depending on the color you like. I have found the Onyx sand to be particularly good for my plants.You would not need to fertilize with these substrates.

Don ;D

[radafmd]

Do LFS carry fluorite? It looks like about $8 a bag on-line but I'm sure the shipping cost is high do to the weight. Where do people get their fluorite?
Thanks

[shalu]

Many people were successful asking PetsMart managers to price match the online price. Just print out the online price sheet and take it to the store, it works most of the time.

[Wolf_Mek]

Check out Home Depot for the schultz aquatic soil (it's actually gravel), it's worked really well in my planted 55g and is cheaper than flourite. You have to be sure to rise it well with warm water to get the gravel to release bubbles and debris though.

[radafmd]

I purchase a bag of Schultz aquatic soil yesterday and it looks like the color and size that I was looking for. Does anyone have any long term experience with this aquatic soil? Do I need to add additional fertilizer with this or not? Anyone have a picture with it in their planted tank?
Thanks

[shalu]

I don't have it in my tanks, but used it in the pond. Some people who used it complained that it is too light and plants uproot easily.

[Wolf_Mek]

Here's the 55g, I have sand over the aquatic soil, but I've only fertilized this tank once.

Besides the scheduled water changes, this tank gets very little attention, so the aquascaping kind of stinks.

[RyanGSP]

What does that schultz stuff cost?

[Wolf_Mek]

At Home Depot I think it was 6 or 7 dollars for a 10lb bag.

[RyanGSP]

Is i pretty fine or realy coarse?? I mean im sure it is courser than sand but ah i will look at it when i go get it.

[radafmd]

I purchased a 10lb bag at yardbirds in California for $6.75. It's not course and is not as fine as sand. It's somewhere in the middle. In fact, it's color is not as light as sand and it's not dark. It's somewhere in the middle. Those two qualities were what I was looking for. The third quality was it's ability to act as an adequate substrate for plants without adding a lot of ferts. We'll see if that is true as I am going to use it in a 180 gallon planted discus tank.

It sounds like some on this forum have a bottom layer of a good substrate and a top layer of sand. How do you keep the two seperated when you gravel vac?
Thanks

[Wahter]

It sounds like some on this forum have a bottom layer of a good substrate and a top layer of sand. How do you keep the two seperated when you gravel vac?
Thanks


That's why I use a 50/50 mix of Flourite and 2-3mm sized gravel for substrate. ;D

I tried the Schultz product before, and I don't know if a large sword plant could hold itself down without becoming uprooted and float to the top. It's very light weight.

Here's a pic of a tank I setup with a 50/50 mix for the substrate.

[Wolf_Mek]

With sand on top of the soil, you don't need to gravel vac, at least not in the conventional way. With sand, debris doesn't get trapped between the particles like it does in gravel, so it sits on the top of the sand and you just have to hover the end of a syphon tube (not the big cylinder piece, you don't want to use that) about a centimeter above it and it gets sucked up. With sand, it's also easier for your filter to collect material, so if you have good circulation, sometimes your filter does all the bottom cleaning for you and you just have to rinse out your filter material.

[RyanGSP]

WOW Wahter. Can i save that pic and use it to show what a nice tank can look like. I am making a discus slide show i will credit you for it?
Update. I bought a garbage can with locking lid from home depot. No FLourite anywhere >:( umm bought clay pots. How can i sterolize these ??? I think tomorrow or sunday i will put my plants in the pots.

[FrankR]

Check out Home Depot for the schultz aquatic soil (it's actually gravel), it's worked really well in my planted 55g and is cheaper than flourite. You have to be sure to rise it well with warm water to get the gravel to release bubbles and debris though.


I also used the Schultz Aquatic soil and covered it with sand. I feel that this was a good move, and all 80 of my plants are thriving in this substrate combination.

[radafmd]

FrankR.
Do you find that your plants are anchored well? Do you have any problems with them up rooting?

Do you add any additional fertilizer or has the schultz been sufficient?
Thanks

[FrankR]

I have never had a plant uproot so I feel that they anchored themselves very, very well. The nice thing about Discus is that they do not dig plants up. I do add a weekly suppliment of plant fertilizer from SeaChem and an Iron Suppliment from SeaChem.

Looking underneath the tank , it is amazing to see the root growth.

[ed8t]

PumaWard, FrankR and others uses sand on top of another substrate ie. Flourite or Schultz's, do you ever have a problem of anerobic pockets or sand compaction if you don't stir up the sand?

I'm trying to avoid mixing the substrates together but I would be concerned about anerobic pockets of air forming in the sand.

[Wolf_Mek]

I have never experience problems with the pockets even in fully sand substrates, and the pockets also can occur in gravel, so, IMO you're not risking any more with sand. The key to the pockets is :

1.) stir the substrate a lot
2.) never touch it
3.) get malaysian trumpet snails (as they burrow into the sand) and just be wary when working in the tank.

[Frankr409]

PumaWard, FrankR and others uses sand on top of another substrate ie. Flourite or Schultz's, do you ever have a problem of anerobic pockets or sand compaction if you don't stir up the sand?

I'm trying to avoid mixing the substrates together but I would be concerned about anerobic pockets of air forming in the sand.

I am thinking that anerobic pockets would be a problem if I had fewer plants. The roots that spread actually oxygenate the immediate areas around the root according to the plant books that I have read. In my tank the roots are everywhere so I doubt that there is any significant buildup of these so called pockets. To be on the safe side my filtration systems are filtering about 1500 gallons per hour, so it is turning the tank about 12 times an hour. My guess is that if any nasty gas were to burp out of the sand, it ain't gonna be a problem for long.

I vac the sand substrate weekly or thereabouts and there is a certain amount of stirring that occurs there. I've never seen anything nasty leech out yet.

[tarantula]

is a good option the silica gravel?

silica: (crystalline compound commonly found in sand and quartz (used to produce glass, cement, ceramic, and other products))

Thanks