Changing Substrate

[Mr_B]

So i got this great idea in my head, right now i have some gravel in my 120g that has been running for a year or so. I've been looking at pictures of other peoples tanks and i like the way it looks with sand.

I have a 4 discus, 8 tetras, some shrimp and 4 corys.

Would it be stupid to switch out the gravel at this point to replace it with sand or would it be ok.

[Cullymoto]

going to hi-jack your thread a little but... any time i add shrimp to my tank it turns into a feeding frenzy.... what shrimp are you keeping?

[Mr_B]

Haha, it's cool. I have 1 ghost shrimp, and 5 amano shrimp. I always see the ghost, and rarely see the amano, as far as i know, all 5 are still alive :)

[Cullymoto]

i see... will look into amano's... as far as changing your substrate goes I see no issue, so long as you change it out fairly slowly... your gravel bed houses A LOT of beneficial bacteria. Removing it all in one shot could send your tank into a cycle. change out a corner at a time, with your regular W/C schedule is my opinion.

[Mr_B]

Cool, i think i might do that, i'm really digging the look of sand. Amano's are just algae eating shrimp so i think they when the light is on, then come out when the light's off.

[pcsb23]

It will be fine to switch over the substrate.

[les2011]

going to hi-jack your thread a little but... any time i add shrimp to my tank it turns into a feeding frenzy.... what shrimp are you keeping?

I have 3 whisker shrimp, and 3 bamboo shrimp and they are getting bigger every week.

[b Lurkn]

So i got this great idea in my head, right now i have some gravel in my 120g that has been running for a year or so. I've been looking at pictures of other peoples tanks and i like the way it looks with sand.

I have a 4 discus, 8 tetras, some shrimp and 4 corys.

Would it be stupid to switch out the gravel at this point to replace it with sand or would it be ok.

I would be fine i have done this in the past. The hardest part for me was just getting the gravel out.
But after that all i did was cleaned the sand and scooped it into a bowl, lowered the bowl low into the tank and dump the sand right on the bottom. took a day or 2 to completely clear up, no fish were harmed, and it looked great. Havent looked back since. gravel is lame

[Trier20]

If you have a vessel to put the fish in you can always drain the water and shop-vac the substrate out. It is the fastest and leaves virtually no substrate in the tank when you are done.

[Herbicidal]

A lower tech version of removing the gravel is to use a medium sized rectangular net. Worked great for me when I switched from EcoComplete to Monterey Bay sand. Stay away from using a siphon as it will just jam up. Ask me how I know. :p

You may have already figured this out, but you'll need to decide on the 'grain' size of the sand. Too fine and it will swirl around and is easily disturbed. Too coarse and you might as well have gravel. I went to a local landscape supply company and they had a wall display of glass jars with like 15 different options for just sand! It was awesome! I love the look of sand and it totally brightened up my tank, especially after having the black EcoComplete. My Cories love it too! They are constantly sifting the sand looking for food. They could not do this with the EcoComplete.