Gravel Cleaning

[Fraser Anderson]

How often should I be vacuuming my gravel. With every water change?

[reefman MC]

Are you talking about freshwater or marine? If your talking fresh once
every two weeks. If your talkin marine, in my opinion, you shouldn't
vacuum it out at all.


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[Chris \(....\)]

"reefman MC" > wrote in message
...
>
> Are you talking about freshwater or marine? If your talking fresh once
> every two weeks. If your talkin marine, in my opinion, you shouldn't
> vacuum it out at all.
>
>
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> reefman MC
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Even nature clears its sand bed when storms hit. An occasional vaccuming
shouldnt hurt anything. Especially if detirous or bebris builds up.

[reefman MC]

If you don't be careful with a sand bed you'll mess everything up
though. An occasional stir may be good.


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[Rick]

What I do is,

1. If doing a water change-stir up the gravel( not to the point that
it may stress the fish) and do my 25-50% water change.

If the gravel need vaccuming between changes,

2.Using a Vortex Diatom, I use the return line of the Diatom to
slightly stir up just the upper layer or top layer of the Sand. This
then makes the water filled with gunk. Once the water is dirty I run
the diatom to filter the water for 1-2 hrs or until the water is
crystal clear.


The diatom return hose works great in hard to clean areas within the
tank to stir up the gravel as with a Vaccum it is hard to clean the
gravel in hard to reach areas.