Gravel Cleaning

[peacockbetta]

I bought a gravel cleaner at the advice of the fish store person (the tank water was cloudy then) and read somewhere that I should keep the gravel thin and stir it everyday (since I'm a beginner). However, I also have a few aquatic plants that I've tried to placed aesthetcially in my tank, but with the cleaning and stirring, the plants just get all kicked out of place and are now all lop-sided and leaning over in the tank.

Do I even need to clean the gravel and bother with the stirring since I have live plants or do I just have to deal with it and learn to have a steadier hand with maintenance in my tank?

Should I increase the gravel so the plants could actually be partially buried? I have this unnatural gravel that appears to be coated with plastic paint to make it a prettier color. Is that gonna be a problem for my plants?

Thanks for any help anyone can offer.

-PeacockBetta

 

[Aquascaper]

Depending on the size of the tank you should look for about 1.5" - 2" of gravel on the bottom, this will give you enough depth to plant in.
Unfortunately, gravel cleaning is a must as this is where the majority of the fish poo ends up.
Instead of stirring the gravel with your fingers before syphoning, try using a fork. This should cause less disturbance to your plants and also allow you to get deeper into the gravel.

HTH

 

[snowyangel]

Syphoning or cleaning your gravel is a must if you want to remove waste that will eventually raise toxic levels in your tank. You're filter removes some debris, but the rest mostly resides in your gravel. If this waste is let to sit, you're tank will become disease infested.
If you don't want to damage any plants or roots, remove you're plants before syphoning (remember to keep them in water). I too have live plants in my tanks and often have to rearrange my tanks every week from syphoning. It's just all apart of the maintenance. If you leave your plants in there and just lightly syphon around them, those areas will be perfect buildup for ammonia and nitrite(if you don't know what these are refer to this: http/fish.orbust.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=10099).