Planning Questions

[gizzmo341]

i wounld like to change one of my tanks to a planted tank it have a few plants anyway and i was thinking of going of a soil substrate but i still have 5 fish in the tank is there a way of changing it from gravel to soil with out hurting the fish and will the fish eat/dig up the plants
 
2 chinese algae eaters
2 glow light tetras
1 danio
 
after algae eaters have died this tank will become a shrimp 70l tank the others can going into the big tank

 

[Malex530]

Algae eaters will eat plants and get big. Tetras need groups of 6 or more, so do danio. My stocking list: 6 glowlight tetra, 4 danio and 5 ottocinclus for algae. Take all the fish out and put them in a container WITH the aquarium filter running. Or else all the good bacteria dies. Add your soil and plants. Wait a few days or else the soil may kill the fish. After about 2 days re-introduce all the fish (acclimated). Make sure you use LOT'S of Hornwort and stem plants plus a few slow groming like swords or crypts. Hope i helped! 

 

[gizzmo341]

this tanks was set up about 4 years ago they are the last few left, since we decidced to have a change of fish in the tank, and tried moving to the new big tank and would have got more but these 5 have become agessive to the other fish in the big tank
 
one of the algae eaters a 5inches long now it is time to re-home him from what i have read will talk to lfs soon

 

[Tongue_Flicker]

Changing gravel to soil without removing the fish is highly stressful to your remaining fish. That's like re-painting your home with everyone else still inside. Kudos to your remaining fish though lol

 

[TwoTankAmin]

"Algae eaters will eat plants and get big."
 
Two observations on that. There is no such type of fish as an algae eater per se. There are fish and inverts that eat algae. They come in all shapes and sizes. The one things they rarely do is to eat plants. Vegetarian fish eat plants. A perfect example would be the ubiquitous bristlenose plecos. They rasp algae off of things including plant leaves. When the leaf is a sturdy thock anubias leaf there is no damage. But when its a flimsy thing amazon sword leaf the act of rasping the algae off also damages the plant. The fish wasn't after the plant it was after things we often can not see in terms of algae on leaves.
 
Or lets talk SAEs. I have kept a lot of these over the years. I have taken plent of them from .15 inches to 6 inches and fat. I have never seen any of them at any size of age either stop eating algae or eating plants.
 
And the algae eating shimps and snails are also pretty easy on plants too. I believe it is more likely for an omnivorous fish to munch on plants than for an algae eater (or an aufwuchs feeder) to do so.