Do I Need To Clean The Soil In A Planted Tank?

[bb1991]

I was surfing you tube the other day and watching how people clean their fish tanks with only gravel and fake plants in them...That got me thinking...I have medium sized planted tank, but i'm sure all the fish crap that comes out of fish bums would accumulate the same as graveled tanks would...So would i need to clean my soil, or at least vaccuum it once a while? Or do i leave my shrimpees, otos, and the filter do all the cleaning; and scheduled water changes. < Is this enough to keep my tank life healthy for a long time? What do you guys do on planted-tank maintenance?

 

[mike455555]

personally i never clean my gravel / sand. only when i can see all the poo i try to suck as much surface stuff off. but other wise i dont churn it all up

 

[Livewire88]

I never see any poo on top of my substrate on my community tank because the flow from my filters pushes it all into the filter intake. Have only gravel vacuumed once in over a year and have not noticed any problems.

However poo gathers on top of the substrate in my Arc60 tank so I gravel vac round the plants once a week

 

[snazy]

I was surfing you tube the other day and watching how people clean their fish tanks with only gravel and fake plants in them...That got me thinking...I have medium sized planted tank, but i'm sure all the fish crap that comes out of fish bums would accumulate the same as graveled tanks would...So would i need to clean my soil, or at least vaccuum it once a while? Or do i leave my shrimpees, otos, and the filter do all the cleaning; and scheduled water changes. < Is this enough to keep my tank life healthy for a long time? What do you guys do on planted-tank maintenance?

It really depends on the tank. I used to keep my pleco in a 30G initially and I did have to vacuum the gravel. It was filthy, black every time I siphoned. Since the pleco was moved to a 100G tank, the 30G is spotless. I tried to vacuum a few times and almost nothing is coming out. If you are not stocked with fish like that and you have good filtration, then it's not critical but it is good doing it from time to time to get oxygen inside the substrate, otherwise it will develop the wrong bacteria in it and you can get problems. Regardless, I wouldn't bother vacuum where the plants are planted. It's good for them and you shouldn't disturb the soil around them. The plant roots naturally make enough room for oxygen to reach planted areas of the substrate.

The pleco is now in a tank with sand with heavy filtration and I don't need to siphon at all in this tank, the filters seem to do the job as the pleco poo can't get hidden into the substrate anymore. My other tank is with gravel.