Gravel or sand

[IamTheWhoreofBabylon]

On the process of setting up my new 129L cold water tank I have been looking at getting new gravel before transferring the fish and water from the old tank
I like the look of white sand but I usually use a gravel cleaner so would the sand just disappear up it?
How do you clean sand and is it better than gravel?

[IamTheWhoreofBabylon]

120L and do you have any idea how much sand/gravel I would need

[EauRouge]

I use playsand most of the time- it's cheap, it looks natural and it's easy to clean. I hate gravel, all the crap falls into the gaps and it takes ages to clean. With sand, all the crap rests on the top so you just suck it up with the syphon tube. It takes a couple of goes to get the hang of not sucking the sand up as well but it's not that hard. Some people still prefer gravel but I'd go with sand every time.

The only thing you have to worry about with sand is anaerobic patches, but if you bung in a load of burrowing snails then they'll take care of turning the sand over for you.

How big are the bags of white sand?

[cheesecheeseplease]

Eau which snails burrow? I've got play sand ready lol!!

[EauRouge]

Malaysian trumpet snails and assassin snails both burrow. MTS breed more quickly so if you overfeed you might end up with millions. I've never had a problem though. You can't mix the two because assassin snails eat other snails.