New to the forum! :)

Guanchy

Guanchy

Medium Fish
#1
Jul 17, 2013
93
0
0
New York
#1
Hey im new here soo i figured ill introduce myself. Im Guanchy and im technically new to the fish world and im loving it!

I have a 15g tank, just a few days ago went from gravel to sand and got a bunch of new decorations! i really love the sand so do my neon tetras and cory cat!

Also have a couple of questions, thats how i found this forum, googling some answers to my questions but i will ask those later (i dont wanna be the annoying newbie) lol

Ive looked into a couple of Aquarium forums and they are not really active at all, hopefully this one is not as dead as the other ones.

here is a picture of my tank:

photo.jpg
 

FreshyFresh

FreshyFresh

Superstar Fish
#2
Jan 11, 2013
1,337
23
38
East Aurora, NY
#2
Welcome G.

Tank looks nice! Do you have a decent liquid test kit to monitor water parameters? (ammonia, nitrite, nitrate)

Neons can be sensitive to parameters changes, which can happen when you change substrates.
 

Guanchy

Guanchy

Medium Fish
#3
Jul 17, 2013
93
0
0
New York
#3
FreshyFresh said:
Welcome G.

Tank looks nice! Do you have a decent liquid test kit to monitor water parameters? (ammonia, nitrite, nitrate)

Neons can be sensitive to parameters changes, which can happen when you change substrates.
Click to expand...
Hey thanks a lot :), yeah i actually have a kit i keep checking the water frequently to make sure all is right!
and i actually got my Neons after i switched from gravel to sand.

I want to get more live plants eventually, i want to have a nice planted tank.
 

Guanchy

Guanchy

Medium Fish
#7
Jul 17, 2013
93
0
0
New York
#7
thank u!! i appreciate that.
yeah its black sand i love it! i had white gravel before and i didnt really like it.

i bought it from petco is this one right here: Petco Black Aquarium Sand at PETCO

i was scared at first because i read a lot about it before putting it in the tank and a lot of people were saying to wash it like 5 times before putting it in, that my filter might get damaged or that the water was going to be very cloudy! but nothing bad happended at all. i washed it once and when i put it in the tank it went straight to the bottom of the tank. i havent had any issues so far and its been almost two weeks.
 

exhumed07

exhumed07

Superstar Fish
#11
Apr 30, 2006
1,774
0
36
Illinois
#11
well mostly when you get cloudy water its from stuff like play sand. also when ruining filters it's from active fish kicking up the sand. fish like cichlids. as for the plants i would recomend looking into a dirted tank. it would not be hard to drain the tank and remove the sand and keeping it wet and adding the dirt, then putting the sand back and refilling the tank. as long as the sand stays wet your beneficial bacteria will stay alive and not hurt the tank as far as the cycle is concerned. to me there is no better way to go with a planted tank then to go with dirt. don't have to worry about ferts and i've noticed with dirt you can get away with lower lighting. and plants that demand higher light seem to grow better with reduced light. just my suggestion :p
 

DuctTape

DuctTape

Small Fish
#12
Jul 25, 2013
15
0
0
Iowa
#12
Ya dirt definitely rules. Just make sure if you do to cap the dirt really well with the sand. When I dirted my 15 gallon a while back I didn't cap it well enough and it made the water nasty. Can't wait to see updates and whatnot on your tank, it looks good!
 

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