Gravel Vaccing Eco-complete

[DanS]

Hi All, I have a newly set-up tank with eco-complete, i think it looks great and hope it will help my plants to grow. I'm new to fish keeping and am just getting into the maintenance regimes. I am finding it tough to clean though - I'm trying to get close enough to the substrate to get any waste, but not close enough to suck up the smaller bits of eco-complete - which is proving pretty tough.

Any advice on how to clean the sub-strate properly?

Cheers!

Dan

 

[Themuleous]

Ive got EC and its a tricky one to keep clean, normally though, the massive of plant roots should deal with most things though so there shouldn't be a need to keep things ultra clean.

Sam

 

[nicklfire]

Yea when your doing the water changes and your running high tech which i dont know if you are, but the plants will absorb that waste through the roots.. and are beneficial to them. You probably arnt overstocking so the waste should not be a problem. I just change water and not worry about the substrate that much.

 

[frozenbarb]

dont need to vac the gravel, the muck that build up is ferts and nutrients for plants

 

[MoonstruckMuse]

I also use Eco-complete, and since I don't heavily plant, I know exactly what you mean. If you have smaller/more delicate fish and plants, you can use a turkey baster/pipette to draw out wastes specifically. My fish are larger and my plants fairly indistructable though, so I just stick my arm in (rinsed off, of course), and swill the stuff around, and vac about an inch or so off the substrate. The eco-complete stays close to the ground, and the debris & muck rises right up. Might not be so great for any bottom dwelling fish though, as this can cause a spike of ammonia in the area (or so I've heard, I've personally never had this prob).

But yeah, heavily plant, and you won't have a problem. Easiest solution.