Sand Or Gravel

[nannerla]

I was reading an article in a magazine a while back about huge pockets of methane iunder the ocean floor but i dont remember anything about it.

[Dominic]

I not exactly sure but I'm pretty sure methane is just a natural side effect of oil pockets in the earth.  When you find one you find the other.  That is one reason why when you see oil pumping stations you'll see a giant flame burning off the methane that is being released when you pump out the oil.

[fruitylicious]

Methane is the same gas cows emit.

The sand is hard to clean with a gravel vacuum. one suggestions was to hook the vacuum up outside at the place where you hook up your hose and run the tube through a window that way if you suck out some sand it goes on the ground and not into your plumbing. A turkey baster also works good for picking up the fish poop. i think if you have small fish it wouldn't be so bad i have a pleco and 2 fairly large jack dempseys that have like 9 inch poo and its heavy so it won't go up the vacuum without breaking it up, or getting close and sucking up some sand too.

[guppiesRus]

Ive been thinking about converting one of my tanks to sand as well, and I was wondering...I have a manuel gravel vac, (you know, the old fashioned kind that you have to siphen out...) anyway, would putting say a pantyhose over the end stop it from sucking up sand? Its thin enough to get the dirt and stuff, but do you think it is thick enough to keep sand out?

[fruitylicious]

nope the fine sand would go through it. if you spent the dough on the tahitian moon sand or the pool filter sand it might not but i don't know.

[Skye?]

I actually have a tank that is sand wit ha bit of gravel mixed in (i didn't have enough of both, so i just mixed them together to get enough) and i clean it be removing the two fish, and then stirring it up a whole lot, and then the filter cleans up al lthe dirt. It actually works really well !

[Halcyon]

Morgrid and fruitylicious:  You both said it was much more difficult to clean sand.  How is it so?  What kind of provisions do you have to make for cleaning sand as opposed to gravel?

[fruitylicious]

It is harder to vacuum the fish poop up I can't plunge the vacuum into the sand or it sucks up the sand and it is bad for the plumbing. I have to swirl the vacuum above the poop and try to lift it off the sand then suck it up. I have found a never seen soap turkey baster works better for sucking up the nastiness. It is more time consuming. After i change the water i take a plastic fork and run it through the sand to make sure there is no methane gas pockets because my sand get compacted in places sometimes. The gravel I just plunge the vacuum deep into the gravel and it sucks out all the old food and fish poo.

[Halcyon]

Gotcha.  Thanks for the reply!

[Halcyon]

I saw mention of a person who used an airline hose as a vac to pick up detritus from his sand bed.  Has anybody tried this and can offer some input as to how effective it is?