I have a combo of gravel with river rocks scattered on top, but it's just for looks. And I always put a plastic bag in the sink to catch bits that fall, cause I refuse to clean out the trap if too much goes down the drain, lol
I've never heard of gravel ripping fins before, is that what you think happened?
Yeah....those don't really help me much. I'm too clumsy, I loose pieces anyway xDD Takes to long to get the gravel clean anyway, no matter how I do it...I just personally think its easier and more time-efficient to have marbles or bare bottom in an uncycled tank...then again, this also boils down to personal preference xD Haha.
LOL thats why I have all cycled tanks now.. no more convoluted gravel cleaning!!!!
lol xD All my tanks but three are cycled, and the only one with gravel is my moms....so I have zero say in the matter of what substrate is in that tank, yet I have to clean it ^^;
The reason i think it's the substrste that i'm using is because out of the three tanks i have going right now, two of them have this river rocks or whatever you call them and the three males all have fin issues. I have one male with diffrent grave and his fins are fine! note that for whatever reason my 4 male bettas enjoy swimming on the bottom (searching i guess) . My male with a difrent gravel substrate has no fin issues. so thats preaty much the reason i think it's the river rocks or pebbles that i'm using. so anyhow, was just wondering what others thought about the use of gravel or not. Thanks for the imput everyone. I guess that once the fins are all healed i will have to decide one whats best for the fishies.
They do hunt along the bottom. Mine does it all day. I have river rocks too. I have large ones and smaller ones to fill in the holes so my cory pellets don't disappear into a chasm. I don't have any problem with them. Tango tears his fins on my driftwood fairly often because he insists on shoving himself into crazy positions while hunting but it always grows right back. What kind of fin issues are you seeing exactly? Is it tearing or like, melting?
Well river rocks are the smooth round ones, I don't see anything getting ripped on those, ever. Normal aquarium gravel is fairly fine, but I guess if they where down there a lot and dragging fins on the ground a lot, they might rip something.. in more then 1 fish though.. I don't see that happening.
I think you should look for another cause for the rips.
you know i've checked everything like nitrites, nitrates, ammionia temp. I know it sounds crazy to me also, i'm just going to see how well and how fast they heal up out of those conditions. the strange thing is that my female in a divided tank with 2 of the males is not effected at all. ? go figure
Well, if you'd ever seen the crazy positions mine gets in... I've found him upside down trying to shove his face in a hole in the gravel looking for goodies. Some of my river rocks are angular vs. round and I guess if he got himself contorted enough, he might get his fin caught between two rocks? I assumed it was the driftwood but it might be a combo of the rocks and the decor kinda pincering his tail when he's doing somersaults while hunting. Maybe that's the case with yours?
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Haha.
