Sand Vs. Gravel

[Britesprite]

I currently have gravel in my tank, but I am going to be getting a 40-50 gal sometime soon and was thinking of using sand in it. I was just curious, in your guys' experience, what are the advantages or disadvantages of sand? Or is it just a matter of taste? I know that sand must be a bit trickier to clean.

 

[GobyMaster]

Personally, I really dislike gravel, and I love sand. Sand is a lot better if you are going to have burrowing fish (i.e. Khuli Loaches, Spiny Eels, ect.), and it's still easy to clean. Just get one of the regular vacuums for gravel and have it about an inch above the sand it rotate it. It'll pick up all the crap.
Cheers,
GobyMaster

 

[Britesprite]

Generally how often do you have to vaccum the sand? I would assume that is shows dirt a lot quicker than gravel. I know if would vary from tank to tank depending on the stocking etc. just looking for an idea of what kind of maintenance is involved as opposed to gravel. I do a gravel vac about once a week right now, would that be enough to keep the sand clean?

 

[GobyMaster]

Yeah, that's about when I do it. Every Saturday is when I perform regular matinence, I do a 20% water change, scrub the walls of algae, and vacuum up the crap on the sand.
Cheers,
GobyMaster

 

[rainbowcharmer]

I know a lot of people really like sand as a substrate, but I had horrible luck with it. Maybe it was the kind of sand I had?? It became discolored really quickly, and for some reason the water was always cloudy, no matter what I did.

So I'm back to gravel.

Good luck with whatever you choose.

 

[znk]

You'd have to offer me alot of money to have me switch back to gravel.