Cleaning Sand Substrate

[jimmyhil9]

Hi, I have a planted 10 gallon. It is often difficult to clean the sand as there is little space between the plants. What should I use? Or should I change the substrate or add carpet plants?

 

[BettaBettas]

sand usually can clean itself with proper care, in my 5 gallon I never clean the subsrate since its a "mini dutch aquascape" and the plants, when they lets say lose a leaf. the leaf will act as a natural source for some plant food. so if you have a planted tank (WITH SHRIMP) I recommend not doing a subsrate cleaning. but obviously still do water changes.
to answer your question simply; instead of using the huge vacuum I just use a tube and attempt not to suck up all the sand lol all my tanks are either sanded or Amazonia

 

[Byron]

Agree, I rarely touch the sand substrate. Plants rooted in the substrate, and Malaysian Livebearing Snails, are all you need provided you do not have too many fish (overstocked) or too large, and don't overfeed. Everything in comes out.

 

[AbbeysDad]

+3 - No need to clean sand and it always looks just fine. The only exception might be very white sand in which case I hear some periodically actually remove a very slight tops layer and add some new sand.