Having just set up my first tank with a sand substrate i have been having problems vaccuming it, as i tend to suck up large amounts of sand if i'm too close, but no fish detritus if i'm too far away from the substrate surface. I think however i have found a cunning solution. I use my net to pick up a bunch of sand and let it sieve through it and it leaves fish po and other bits and pieces in the net, to be safely removed! it also disturbs the sand which i'm told helps with reducing the build up nasty gasses and the anaerobic bacteria that leads to them. I then can do a water change using just a siphon. My thoughts are that this is gonna be at least as effective as a gravel vac on a larger substrate. Is there anything fundamentally about using this method that i have missed or can i go ahead with it? Your thoughts are appreciated!
Nothing wrong with the method I can see. A lot of people I know that have sand simply wave their hand around and get the debris off the bottm so they suck it up with the gravel vac. All of them keep Malaysian Trumpet Snails to keep the sand stirred up, espcially if they have plants so the roots don't get compacted and suffocate causing plant problems.
I think I may have a large grain of sand or just a weak vacuum. =X
For my sand substate, I can stick my vacuum into the sand, no sand comes up, but SOME of the poopy does. The piranha poop seems to be to heavy for the vacuum so it makes it kinda difficult =(
i have some marine sand in my brackish tank and to stir it up i use a turkey baster. i just squeeze it a touch above the sand, the sand doesn't fly away but it gets stirred. usually best to get any nasty stuff that's just sitting on top of the sand sucked up first. Oh, don't try to baste your turkey after you do this.
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