# Salvaging a soil substrate tank



## LancsRick (14 Nov 2012)

I set up a Rio 180 a few months ago using a soil substrate and gravel cap, and I'm really not happy with it. 

I've used aquatic soil, with gravel tidy on top, and capped with black gravel. Not only do I STILL have tannins present, despite numerous water changes, chemical filtration, etc etc, but my amano shrimp seem to love the soil, and move away all the gravel in order to pull up pieces of the soil. As a result my tank looks like a right mess.

I'm considering just emptying the whole thing over the Christmas break, removing the soil, and refilling it with cat litter as a substrate to eliminate all my issues. Given that doing all of that will probably be most of a day's work, I was wondering if anyone else had suggestions on how to approach this to eliminate the issues.

Cheers.


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## jack-rythm (14 Nov 2012)

what soil substrate are you using? cat liter as substrate will be very messy.. as its clay based it will murk up very easily. but like everything once settled it will clear. having gravel sitting on top of soil will eventually sink through the soil exposing the soil to the top. this is due to the weight of the gravel and the weight of the soil. depending on the types of soils your problem can be sorted.. when you say 'gravel tidy' what do you mean?

Jack


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## LancsRick (15 Nov 2012)

The gravel tidy is a plastic mesh, but it's a right nuisance I'm finding.

I've got cat litter in another tank and found it's pretty good really - once rinsed thoroughly, it seems to clear in 24 hours and has been zero bother since, so I'm quite taken with it.


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## jack-rythm (15 Nov 2012)

ok so what aquatic soil are you using? Im unsure why you have tannins from aquatic soil. Do you have wood in your tank that is new? Is your aquatic soil a fluval product by any chance?


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## BigTom (15 Nov 2012)

jack-rythm said:
			
		

> ok so what aquatic soil are you using? Im unsure why you have tannins from aquatic soil. Do you have wood in your tank that is new? Is your aquatic soil a fluval product by any chance?



Pond soil of some sort if I remember correctly.

Can leach tannins for a long time, but purigen/carbon in the filter should sort that out. How much gravel cap do you have? Increasing the depth of cap or switching it for sand should stop the Amanos being able to get through it.


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## jack-rythm (15 Nov 2012)

I was going to recommend purigen but was unsure of soil base  I didnt realise there was another post about this somewhere else on the forum!

Cheers tom 

Good luck with your development LancsRick.. 

Jack


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## LancsRick (17 Nov 2012)

I've got an inch or so of gravel cap, the problem I've found is that once the shrimp find a bit of soil, they dig, and once any bit of the gravel tidy is exposed, more soil gets pulled up.

Pretty sure I'm going to rip the tank down in the Christmas break to be honest and redo with Tesco cat litter.


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## Antipofish (17 Nov 2012)

jack-rythm said:
			
		

> what soil substrate are you using? cat liter as substrate will be very messy.. as its clay based it will murk up very easily. but like everything once settled it will clear. having gravel sitting on top of soil will eventually sink through the soil exposing the soil to the top. this is due to the weight of the gravel and the weight of the soil. depending on the types of soils your problem can be sorted.. when you say 'gravel tidy' what do you mean?
> 
> Jack



Hey Jack, dont want to contradict you, but you are thinking about the wrong type of cat litter.  There is a type commonly available that is widely used by plant enthusiasts (too many threads on here to mention cover this). It is not at all messy, although the type you are thinking of would most certainly be.

Having said that, I would encourage the OP AGAINST cat litter from personal experience.  It takes ages to clean it properly and I ended up having to pull it all out and chuck it because of the smell it created.

A much better medium is bonsai soil... again, plenty of threads on here cover this and there are links to which one to get.  Originally people used Akadama, but as that is currently hard to get hold of, people are using other brands of Bonsai soil.

Check out this link...

http://www.theplantedtank.co.uk/akadama.htm

Lots of other interesting articles on that site too


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## LancsRick (17 Nov 2012)

Cheers Anti (as always )

I've used the cat litter in my other tank and didn't have too many problems. That said, I did want to try the Akadama this time, but getting hold of the hard stuff is impossible locally really, and it's 3x the price of cat litter to get it off eBay. All I know is that I'm never using proper soil again, it's been too much of a chore by a long way!!


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## jack-rythm (17 Nov 2012)

yes your right, 

I also use akadama in my jungle nano and have a quite an interesting debate on the methodology behind it. have a look if this interests you. I formed my substrate using bonsai akadama, peat moss and compost. more info is there on my jungle journal. I must say out of all my tanks my akadama tank is BY FAR the most matured and sustainable tank I have, by this I mean I have used it in my walstad tank. Its about 4 months old and I wish my other tanks took on the same simple maintainable temperament as this one.

hope you find your solution mate

Jack


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## ghostsword (19 Nov 2012)

Use either akadama, unipac gravel, or aquarium gravel.. 

Why bother with the rest?

I have even used amazonia mixed with akadama on large tanks with good result.




___________________________
Luis 
@ghostsword


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