Cosmetic sand has advantages such as providing a bright look to the aquascape and ensuring an open space in the layout. On the other hand, there are also disadvantages of cosmetic sand including that it can get dirty easily and that excessively thick cosmetic sand may easily become anaerobic.
To improve these disadvantages, it is advised to keep the cosmetic sand layer as thin as about 1 ~ 2 cm in a tank. In addition, you need to agitate the cosmetic sand periodically with a substrate cleaner. Doing this helps prevent worsening of anaerobic condition of the cosmetic sand and also keeps the foreground free from algal growth. The grains of cosmetic sand are fine and light. When using a substrate cleaner, lightly pinch the hose with one hand to regulate the vacuuming speed
It is possible to grow aquatic plants in a substrate made up of only Aqua Soil if you plan to do a makeover of the aquascape within a year, or if you are not planning on maintaining the aquascape for a long time. If, however, if you intend to maintain the aquascape for a long period of time or if you wish to have lush rosette-type aquatic plants in the aquarium, you must use Substrate like ADAPower Sand or JBL Aquabasis or Tropica Substrate as well as Aqua Soil. Substrate like Power Sand contains slow release nutrients in addition to rich nutritional elements derived from fertile peat. It is made from volcanic stones and has a wide variety of benefits that help with the maintenance of your aquascape, including promoting good water circulation within the substrate where it is usually prone to water stagnation.
In addition to that, the use of additives such as ADA Super 4 is recommended. These additives can be applied only during the initial stage of aquarium. If you wish to have a better and more perfect substrate system for your aquarium, it is advisable to use the substrate additives whether the aquascape will be maintained for a long time or not.
Vacuuming surface detritus from the substrate- looks tedious, but is actually quite easy with practice. It makes a significant impact on algae issues in a tank. Livestock will be happier with the cleaner environment as well. Detritus as plant food? Yes, but algae will get to it first.
Elemental fertilizer is much cleaner and does not trigger algae like detritus will. In slow growing low tech tanks, the organic waste generated in the tank may not build up significantly as microbes are able to keep up with the breaking down of detritus.
In CO2 injected tanks, there is often more waste produced than the tank’s bio-filter can digest; this, coupled with high lighting become prime triggers for algae. In the tank above, keeping vulnerable slow growing plants (Bucephalandra, Trithuria) under very high lighting (8 X T5 tubes over a 90p 47g). Substrate PAR is 200+. However, they are algae free due to the clean environment.