Tropical fish tank?

[Ryan Pultz]

Ok i know there has to be a few fish tank junkies on Ifish any way I have a few questions I am going to be starting a new tank and it will be a tropical tank but I have seen a few tropical tanks that have Sand instead of rock at the bottom I am not going to be using a bottom filter so the rocks ate not a necessity I was told I could use sand at the base but it was harder to clean then say rocks so My question is has anyone ever done this? and How would you clean the sand? And is it really that hard?

[Riverkeeper]

If you search around a bit, you should be able to find some natural colored, pea sized round gravel that is nice looking. Beats the fake colored stuff. I have never used sand, but it seems like it would be hard to manage on the occasions when you do have to dump out the whole tank and refill.

[kamloops]

You are going to be at risk of fouling your water.
The use of a undergravel filter is what the nitrites and nitrates use to breakdown fish waste and uneaten food. I hope you use a Big filter and little if any rocks and live plants.
Good Luck

I assume your going fresh and not salt.

[lost_sailor]

I think you would just replace sand instead of trying to clean it. Under-gravel filters work great, what are you using?

[pdxkevin]

What type of fish are you going to put in there?

Sounds like fresh water. Are you going for the more colorful (yet more agressive) African Cichlids? If so you may want to avoid going with an undergravel filter as these guys like to dig... a lot. they move the gravel around enough to comprimise the effectiveness of an undergravel filter.

There are some great outside power filters. Make sure you get one rated to your size tank and rince out the spounge block a couple times per month.

[Ryan Pultz]

We are going freshwater and I have not decided on the fish yet I just like to look of the sand better than say fake looking rock. I will search around if i can find some rock that looks nice i will go with rock and an under gravel filter.

[Swamp Puppy]

i highly recommend NOT using sand in your tank. it looks good, but is a real pain in the arse to keep clean. if you do however, only use a thin layer of it and invest in a good canister filter to handle the filtration / de-nitrifying processes. Fluval makes a good one. the 303 model will handle most practical size tanks. use a smaller model if you are going to have a 20 gallon or less tank.

instead of sand, try using a smaller size of rock. you can get some fairly small sizes that will give you the same look and be easier to clean.

[Crashin' Bait]

I use natural gravel that you can buy at any good pet store. Also, when the filter gets established, you can't beat an underground with a couple of powerhead pumps. I have had Africans in a tank with an underground filter system. To remedie the "digging" problem I took half of the gravel out of the tank and layed a small mesh vexar screen down. Then I replaced the gravel and all of the boulders (African cichlids love rock piles).

[El Toro]

Sand is more of a hassle than an underground filtration system. I recently bought a newer tank for salt water... fluctuations in the chemicals can and have changed dramatically when I first cleaned my sandy bottom. Sand looks a lot better than gravel, but it's more expensive and involves more time!