Tropical Fish Forum

Tropical Fish Keeping Help and Advice => Fish Tank Plant Advice => Aquascaping => Topic started by: LeakysLab on April 30, 2020, 10:48:52 PM

Title: Adding more substrate
Post by: LeakysLab on April 30, 2020, 10:48:52 PM

Good evening fellow fish keepers!  :fishy1:

I am in need of some advice/ideas in to how to add more Substrate to my tank as I don’t like how it looks and wish to thicken the layer to allow better plant anchoring and improve the scape generally as I’m added more plants to the tank.

The substrate I have is TMC NutraSoil. Now it has been 4/5 months since the tank was established and I have done some research into added more soil but mine has an added issue. It will leach ammonia for two weeks after adding to the tank. I’m left not sure on how to proceed.

Any comments are welcome  ;D

Title: Re: Adding more substrate
Post by: Matt on May 01, 2020, 04:14:37 AM

First move for me would be to soak the substrate in a bowl of water until you can no longer get an ammonia reading from it. I had some that too over 4 weeks to reach this point!!  We can then think about how to add it depending on how soft it is too after soaking.

Title: Re: Adding more substrate
Post by: LeakysLab on May 01, 2020, 12:36:08 PM

Thanks @Matt I'll put some in a container today. What would it mean if it was too soft after soaking?

Title: Re: Adding more substrate
Post by: Matt on May 01, 2020, 08:09:59 PM

Sometimes being clay based it can soften in the water and break down quite significantly when handled - not all brands do this and I’m not familiar with yours. We can get round it, it’s just easier if this doesn’t happen!!

Title: Re: Adding more substrate
Post by: LeakysLab on May 01, 2020, 08:14:39 PM

Ok cool, well I’ve got some in a container and filled with water I’ll test it next week or after that. I’ll post again here once Ammonia is 0.