Habitat - Indoor :: Sand substrate question...

[77f2504by4]

I decided to use sand as my substrate and now i have a small problem. when i do a water change, and dump the new water in it kicks up all the sand. it settles out right away, but it coats everything in the tank in a fine layer of sand. is there any way to minimise this? i tried pouring the bucket real slow to no avail, and i also tired pouring it into something hard, and again it doesn't help. what do you guys and girls running sand do to stop this?

also on a side note, untill today i was useing a home made syphon, and it worked like crap. it would empty too much water before i got a chance to clean up all the food bits. the cheapo one i got at petsmart is so much better. i can actually clean all the food up and do a 10% water change at the same time! hooray!

[Jaysea]

Some people pour the water so it runs down the inside of the glass to help reduce any splashing, you might try that if you haven't.

[77f2504by4]

I did try that, it has the same effect. but maybee i was spilling it to fast when i tried that...

[sagoy]

You can try moving the water using a hose and letting the water hit the side of the tank first instead of the sand so it minimizes the sand kicked up. Pouring water might be a little messy if you have sand.

[steve]

How long have you had sand? My understanding is that it should settle back to normal pretty quickly if it's been thoroughly cleaned.

[77f2504by4]

i have had it about 2 weeks. it does settle out right away. like less than a minute. but everything in the tank gets "dusted" with sand.

[Jaysea]

I just added sand in my tank tonight. Had zero clouding i just put a lid to a tupperwear container in there and let the water run from the bucket onto it, instead of splashing off the sand the water just overflowed off of the lid. You might want to try that next time, hope it helps.

[my.lovely.turtle.]

yes as the idea above, set in the tank on the sand a bowl and start to slowly fill the bowl, it will over flow therefore start the fill the tank with very much less splash

[77f2504by4]

that sounds like it will work. next water change I'll see if it does.

The other thing i was thinking, i have a few submersible pumps, maybe i use a pump to get a hose effect?

or

the tank is at the bottom of the stairs so if i had a long enough hose i could just use the syphon effect...

the bowl idea sounds best.

[sagoy]

If you have a water source at the top of the stairs, siphon effect will work nice as well.