I'm Switching To Sand!

[emmettbaby]

So I have heard many people say silica is bad. I have also heard people say silica is fine as long as it's fine grain. Anyways I have the silica and was wondering if I can change the substrate while the fish are in the tank?

 

[tom130691]

i did stress them alot tbh, drop the water rightdown, i used then net to get alot of gravel out washed the sand in a bucket and added it in the filled up left it half hour water change then replanted my plants and i was done

 

[Night61]

tom is right, you will have to remove the fish to safely remove the gravel.

 

[Ben M]

i couldn't remove my fish, as they were tiny and really fast, so i scooped the gravel out with a net and small tub, then left the rubbish to settle. when the rubbish settled, i syphoned it out, and added the pre washed sand. the fish didn't seem at all bothered.

cheers

 

[emmettbaby]

ok so i did the switch today. I washed the sand for about two hours. Then my friend and I took a window screen and sifted all the sand I was putting in my tank and got about 1/4 lb. of large pieces of rocks and quartz so now the sand is as fine as it can get. Since my fish were fairly large, I caught them with a net and put them in a bucket with an air stone. So far, the air stone has kept the cories from poisoning the scissortails (which is what happened the first time i let the LFS put cories and scissortails in the same bag... NEVER DO THAT!) Right now, the water is pretty murky. Should I turn my filter on or wait for most that stuff to settle on the bottom?

 

[flip]

wait for it to settle a bit, if any sand gets sucked into the filter it can reak havok on the impeller.