Tank setup problem - Kitty litter substrate "puffing up"

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Would love some help.... Am in the midst of setting up a 10 Gallon tank
which is going to be planted/low-maintenance acquarium. Plan for
substrate was as follows 1in kitty litter (walmart special kitty)
terraced up to 1.5 inches towards the rear of the tank. Litter would
have a little bit of Jobe's for fertilizer. Then a uniform 2 in layer
play sand on top of that.

After reading up a lot i decided not to rinse the litter first and put
it straight in. Levelled it at approximately 1in. Scattered small
pieces of Jobe's spikes very deep - i.e. at the bottom of the
substrate. Propbably was about 1.5 spikes total cut into small bits.
Then I gradually added water..... Plan was to let it absorb the water
and settle a bit.... then later I would add a little more towards the
rear of the tank to "terrace".... so that there would never be less
than 1 in litter. After that was planning to add the sand layer after
this bottom one was stable and had dried a bit (e.g. tomorrow
sometime).

WELL added the water and Suprise - the litter more than doubled in
capacity..... it's now about 2.5in and I was planning to have 3-3.5in
total substrate after the sand layer. The water is pretty much absorbed
except for a few pools on the surface. Is the kitty litter layer going
to recede or did i just make an awful mistake and need to remove at
least half of it before it dries? Should I really have only places
0.3/0.5in dry litter to start?

I really thought that I had researched this to exhaustion before
starting, but apparently not enough.

Opinions welcome and needed!

Thanks!

[Mister Gardener]

On 8 Apr 2006 23:37:37 -0700, wrote:

>Would love some help.... Am in the midst of setting up a 10 Gallon tank
>which is going to be planted/low-maintenance acquarium. Plan for
>substrate was as follows 1in kitty litter (walmart special kitty)
>terraced up to 1.5 inches towards the rear of the tank. Litter would
>have a little bit of Jobe's for fertilizer. Then a uniform 2 in layer
>play sand on top of that.
>
>After reading up a lot i decided not to rinse the litter first and put
>it straight in. Levelled it at approximately 1in. Scattered small
>pieces of Jobe's spikes very deep - i.e. at the bottom of the
>substrate. Propbably was about 1.5 spikes total cut into small bits.
>Then I gradually added water..... Plan was to let it absorb the water
>and settle a bit.... then later I would add a little more towards the
>rear of the tank to "terrace".... so that there would never be less
>than 1 in litter. After that was planning to add the sand layer after
>this bottom one was stable and had dried a bit (e.g. tomorrow
>sometime).
>
>WELL added the water and Suprise - the litter more than doubled in
>capacity..... it's now about 2.5in and I was planning to have 3-3.5in
>total substrate after the sand layer. The water is pretty much absorbed
>except for a few pools on the surface. Is the kitty litter layer going
>to recede or did i just make an awful mistake and need to remove at
>least half of it before it dries? Should I really have only places
>0.3/0.5in dry litter to start?
>
>I really thought that I had researched this to exhaustion before
>starting, but apparently not enough.
>
>Opinions welcome and needed!
>
>Thanks!
I've used an inch of kitty litter under gravel several times and it
didn't expand like you describe. Are you certain that your kitty
litter is 100% clay with nothing, no super absorbers etc added? (and a
few swirls through the rinse bucket saves a lot of time and filter
media when filling the tank.)

Your covering the entire tank bottom with play sand is another issue -
if you've read my recent posts, you'll know that I have used small
areas of sand substrate, but never a whole tank. All sorts of
questions come to mind about cleaning, anaerobic pockets, etc. Tell me
more.

-- Mister Gardener

[fa]

hi mister
yes i'm positive i used the right litter - i researched this very
carefully
it's plain clay and it's a brand that has been used repeatedly and
successfully
i found material going either way (concerning rinsing) so i chose not
to to simplify things - appears to have been a mistake
this is going to be my 1st time w- sand on top.... but many many people
use it for an entire tank - here are examples of setup
http://groups.google.com/group/rec.aquaria.freshwater.plants/browse_frm/thread/c51e90c072ccf8fe/71d758ea0b866310?q=sand+litter&rnum=6#71d758ea0b866310
http://groups.google.com/group/rec.aquaria.freshwater.plants/browse_frm/thread/aa5fba80b2f37f04/d047035c8bfda010?q=sand+litter&rnum=1#d047035c8bfda010

[Mister Gardener]

On 9 Apr 2006 06:44:18 -0700, "fa" > wrote:

>hi mister
>yes i'm positive i used the right litter - i researched this very
>carefully
>it's plain clay and it's a brand that has been used repeatedly and
>successfully
>i found material going either way (concerning rinsing) so i chose not
>to to simplify things - appears to have been a mistake
>this is going to be my 1st time w- sand on top.... but many many people
>use it for an entire tank - here are examples of setup
>http://groups.google.com/group/rec.aquaria.freshwater.plants/browse_frm/thread/c51e90c072ccf8fe/71d758ea0b866310?q=sand+litter&rnum=6#71d758ea0b866310
>http://groups.google.com/group/rec.aquaria.freshwater.plants/browse_frm/thread/aa5fba80b2f37f04/d047035c8bfda010?q=sand+litter&rnum=1#d047035c8bfda010

Well, I suppose you could just scoop out the extra clay that you don't
want. I can't think of anything that would cause it to reduce to its
original size, you haven't added the sand on top yet, have you? I read
the links you sent above, thanks for finding them, I've been meaning
to go on a search for them one of these days. I don't see anyone else
mentioning the kitty litter expansion problem. And I really don't
recall having similar problems myself.

-- Mister Gardener