# Shell Dweller Substrate



## IndyFishFan (Jun 23, 2005)

Hello Everyone -

I have a 29 gallon tank and I plan on putting shell dwelling cichlids in it. As the tank is right now, I have texas holey rock, tufa rock, and lava rock for cover as well as the majority of the the open space on the bottom covered in shells. The substrate is sand. My question is this, whenever I use sand or another fine substrate my tanks never seem to do as well. I don't know if I'm not cleaning the substrate well enough or what but my nitrates seem to shoot up and are hard to get down and as a result the fish die and I have brown algae everywhere. 

My question is this, would it be a terrible idea to use a larger grade substrate with shell dwellers? I'm thinking about ordering a bag of cichlid substrate through Dr. Foster and Smith that has gravel and crushed shells. What do you guys think? Is it a viable option? If not I may just switch the substrate and find other fish to keep in that tank. Thanks for your help!


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## Guest (Aug 23, 2008)

You really do want sand with shellies. I'm not sure why you're having trouble with nitrates when using sand. As long as you're doing regular water changes, gravel vacs, and not over-feeding, you should be fine. Sand doesn't generally let waste get deep into the substrate bed, but if you're swirling it up rather than hovering over the surface, debris may get trapped and change your water parameters.

Anyway, I really wouldn't use a substrate other than sand for shellies. If you want to go the gravel route, I would consider kribensis.


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## IndyFishFan (Jun 23, 2005)

I figured so much. I don't know what the deal is, I mean I understand what you're saying and I see the debris on top of the sand and I vac it off. Still for whatever reason I have all this brown algae in my tank and I'm assuming that it translates into high nitrates. Though to be perfectly honest it could also be because the tank catches some sunlight for about three hours a day from a skylight. I don't know I'm just tired of having fish die on me when I know I can do better. Thanks for your help, I appreciate it


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## Guest (Aug 24, 2008)

I agree with Leah. Use sand. I wouldn't worry about using a cichlid substrate unless you have a low pH and soft water. The tufa rock should help that though, so really you could save money and buy some pool filter sand.

The type of shell dwellers you get will decide the depth, but for most, you don't need but a very thin layer of sand.


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