Substrate change process

[Lee171181]

Hi, am wanting to change my substrate from white (now brown) sand to dark JBL sand. Just wondering whats the best way of doing this?

Is it a case of all fish in a bucket, drain it all out, swap substrate & fill back up then add fish back in?

Would I be able to get away with 100% water chage if the filter media is all left as is, or would i need to save some of the existing water & put that back in?

Any help/advice greatly appreciated.

Thanks

 

[Ch4rlie]

Best way is to move fish to a temporary tank or clean container tub with filter and heater as changing substrate is a messy and time consuming job. Never as quick as you planned.

Switch filter off, heater off, drain tank, take out old substrate and put in new substrate (remember to wash new substrate to rinse off all debris, dirt and dust etc), fill up with fresh dechlorinated water, best method before adding water is to use a dish and pour water directly onto dish as this will help prevent substrate going everywhere and creating a cloudy mess in water which can take hours at best but more likely a day or two to clear up completely.

Once water settled and no cloudy water, switch on filter and heater, all satisfactory and water to desired temp then you can add fish.

You may well get a mini cycle or bacterial bloom as the BB that was on old substrate will have been taken away and the BB will need to recolonise back to normal numbers. Should be fairly quick to happen, anything from a day or two to a week perhaps, as the BB in you filter will help vastly and the regrowth will start quickly.

Do keep an eye on ammonia and nitrite numbers to begin with, do water changes accordingly if you see nitrite or ammonia.

By the way, no point keeping old tank water back into the tank as this wont contain any BB as these is not free floating, just plain old manky water, useless really.