Adding sand to gravel substrate...

[itiwhetu]

Don't get me wrong as I totally appreciate all the info I've been given but there is a bit of me that has become a bit pissed. I didn't ask for my initial fish. I took them in to prevent their death. I got a single black skirt, a common pleco and a little albino cory in a flower vase that may have held a quart of water. To keep them alive I got a 2.5 gallon mini tank while looking for something better. Best I could do was a 20 gallon cube. I added more tetras to give them a group. Now through different threads I'm told that isn't enough and I need more. I ask about corys and am told to add more yet am also told that my tank can't hold more. What am I supposed to do?

Well I think that I just made a decision. I'm going to get more corys and they will be fine as my filtration and air flow can easily handle a larger tank than mine. I also think that I will go ahead and add a half inch of black sand.

I think that I have made a drastic mistake in trying to go current as to tank science. Ya, my 'old school' stuff may be out dated but it worked very well 30 years ago. It should work the same today.

I am in no way putting down any advice I've been given. Still I think that my 'old school knowledge' serves me better as it is what I know. If it worked 30 years ago it will still work today. A week later and the tank tests totally healthy and as close to totally crystal clear even with a slight haze.

I've been fighting with this tank but there was nothing to fight.

Leave the tank and the fish as they are and stop worrying, they will be fine. Just feed them.

 

[Alice B]

I've enjoyed this thread. I have soft rounded gravel, not whatever they are selling these days, and my bronze cory colony was about 9 cories, 2 or 3 guppies for top fish, in a 20 high, on an air driven undergravel and I think they lasted 10 years. Got down to just the offspring. And I went to a fish store and got some young bronze cories to keep them company, and the darn fish were sick, and I didn't do a good enough quarantine and lost all my cories. They never heard of sand bed, they laid their eggs in the fallen leaves from the anubias.

 

[jaylach]

Leave the tank and the fish as they are and stop worrying, they will be fine. Just feed them.

Good advice but I decided that I want the black sand over the brownish gravel base. I want the soft sand for the pleco and corys but also appearance. As to the appearance I like the 'goth look' even though I don't do myself. With the black table, black tank trim/frame, dark fake tree trunk and the black sand I should get a pretty good goth look with the green of the plants being a nice offset.

I only ordered a 5 pound of the sand as I don't need all that much to give a decent layer plus The gravel base is thick enough for the under gravel filtration... Well close to thick enough but a touch shy on average of the desired 3 inches. The addition of the sand should bring that thickness up to optimum.

I looked at a lot of mesh materials for keeping the sand from sifting through the existing gravel and decided on 35 micron nylon mesh. I was tempted by a stainless steel mesh but it was only 304 stainless. If it was 307c stainless I may have gone that direction as 307c is surgical grade such as in making scalpels. I just don't trust the 304 stainless in an aquatic environment with live critters. My knowledge of stainless steel types come from many years as a machinist.

Since I'm getting the sand through an Amazon seller I will definitely boil to sterilize and do a LOT of rinsing to remove dust. Since the nylon mesh is more than I need I can use what is not needed to strain/sift the sand.

 

[jaylach]

I've enjoyed this thread. I have soft rounded gravel, not whatever they are selling these days, and my bronze cory colony was about 9 cories, 2 or 3 guppies for top fish, in a 20 high, on an air driven undergravel and I think they lasted 10 years. Got down to just the offspring. And I went to a fish store and got some young bronze cories to keep them company, and the darn fish were sick, and I didn't do a good enough quarantine and lost all my cories. They never heard of sand bed, they laid their eggs in the fallen leaves from the anubias.

I remember a 30 gallon I had back in Ohio. For the gravel base I took a bucket and a shovel to a local very clear river. Filled the bucket with pebble type gravel from the river bed and used that. Of course I sterilized the river gravel before use.

 

[jaylach]

Sigh, I'm already rethinking on adding the sand. It dawned on me that adding the sand with nylon mesh between the sand and gravel would make things just about impossible to vacuum.

 

[Alice B]

I made a beautiful pattern in the gravel in my 40 long, black and blue, back in 1995 or so. It lasted 3 vacuumings before the gravel was all mixed.