What Sand Do People Use For Shrimp?

[fuzzbuts]

Sorry if this has been covered before but I cant find it if it has.

I am setting up another shrimp tank and have a bag of unopened play pit sand (I use it for my lizard)
Is it ok to use and if so is there any special way to prepare it eg just wash it or does it need to be soaked before (I am using a mature filter from another tank so they can go in in the next couple of days)


Thanks in advance

 

[Shrimper]

The substrate doesn't need to be special for a shrimp tank, the reason most people have something special is for growing plants in it. If your not planning to have demanding plants then play sand will be fine.

I would just rinse it well and you should be fine.

 

[fuzzbuts]

Thanks thats what I thought but hubby had read not to use it for shrimp and so the doubt set in

Emily

 

[~T~]

I use thitian moon sand with mine, looks very nice.

 

[TylerFerretLord]

Most shrimp have no preference when it comes to substrate, although Paleomonetes sp. like to reach around in the crevices of larger gravels.

The only species I know of that does have a requirement is Macrobrachium kulsiense, "Pearl/Sand shrimp", which burrows and thus requires a smaller grained substrate.

 

[Wolfenrook]

I've gone with eco-complete in my shrimp tank, but then I like to heavily plant my tanks. Good plant substrates do come with a small bonus for shrimp tanks as well, that been that quite a few of the minerals that they are enriched with are also benificial for shrimp, eg. the calcium in eco-complete etc.

From my researches shrimp quite often prefer a darker substrate (brown-black) as they are less nervous walking on this. Light substrates tend to be quite reflective and make most aquatic animals jittery in my experience, I have light coloured play sand in my daughters aquarium, and even her adult platies are nervous and hide a lot. This is especially true if your lighting is fairly bright.

Ade