Which Do You Prefer Sand Or Gravel?

[Tolak]

Another blast from the past.

 

[Zeoth]

I'm the 100th voter!!! I don't mind. they both look good to me.

 

[Iron Man]

Sand is the natural environment for a majority of the fish we keep. IMO its a requirement for catfish such as cories and for loaches such as clowns. Its also better (and fun to watch) for shrimp to sift the top layer.

Sand doesn't let poop through the "cracks" like gravel so easily does and therefore doesn't need vacuuming. Gravel needs it say once a week, sand just needs a quick stir over the surface. If you have enough current going over your substrate you don't need to worry about collecting poop at all.

The ONLY drawback to sand that I have found is that it does get these "dark spots" at the bottom where oxygen isn't present. Anaerobic bacteria form here and if you let it build up too much you will get a very fowl sulfur smell when its finally released. This is easily prevented altogether by stirring the sand regularly.

Now some say gravel is cleaner because they get to vacuum to the bottom of the tank and do this every week. That's great. But how many of you take out all your decor and plants and do that every week?

This concludes me to realize the fact that sand IS much cleaner than gravel.

Also, as far as filters being in danger of tearing up....if you turn your filters off while you are stirring the sand there is no danger. There's also ZERO danger at any time with a canister filter such as my Eheim 2217. I've been running this filter with sand for oh man it must be going on 5 years now and its like brand new.

After 5 years of continuous use I STILL catch myself looking at the top of the water to see the current, to see if the filter is even on, its that quiet.

 

[Amunet]

I voted gravel, although sand tanks look awesome.. I'm too messy when I do water changes to ever get sand. I just know I'd get sand everywhere and into the filter which would mess it up... so yeah... gravel for me!
Eco-Complete all the way..

 

[funkyhoney]

I prefer gravel, but a finer grit than your average 5mm stone most places sell; best of both worlds I think. Having said that, sand never did much for me. I still have about 10KG sitting in a bucket somewhere.

 

[evilchild]

setting up a new tank about 260lts and going to put red bellys in. thinking about using sand for this set up. 'Moon Black Sand' so how would i go about cleaning it? just like gravel with the gravel hoover or just net the poo out?

 

[TammyLiz]

To clean the sand you hover the gravel vac over the surface of it, about an inch give or take, depending on how strong the siphon is. You can do quick little swirls to stir up the junk and get it sucked in without getting the sand. Someone here told me that trick a while back and it works great.

I voted either because even though I prefer sand, depending on what tank I'm setting up I do like gravel sometimes.

I have used pool filter sand and think it looks very nice. Some of it is too bright white so look for the stuff that looks a little tan unless you like the glare (I don't). I'm thinking about putting sand in a 120gallon tank now, though, so I might try the play sand. I have not run into the compaction or black junk issue with the pool filter sand, though, since it has bigger grains, so I do think it is superior to the play sand which is so fine.

HTH someone.

Tammy

 

[shang hi]

i,ve only even used gravel.
i might try sand in the future because i want to have an Adolfi Cory tank when in older. With maby 50-100 Adolfi Corys, Hehehe soo many corys!