i need help to clarify doubt about : How do u clean the gravel without uprooting the plants? And is uprooting plants every 2 weeks bad?
I have a 20 gallon fresh water tank and i have some real plants in there. I change 25% of the water every 2 weeks and i use a hose that i cut to siphon the water out. I move around the rocks to bring up all the dirt and stuff and try to suck it out with the hose. But its hard with all my plants in there so i un root them and try and clean the gravel better. Is this bad?
Try this:
Answer by K Block
Your plants would be okay if you uprooted them and placed them in a bucket of water while you strip the tank for a complete clean just make sure the plants are placed in water which is the same temperature as it is in the tank.
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You don’t need to life out every last scrap of dirt. I knock a few younger plants out of my tanks when I do my weekly partial water changes, but never uproot anything big. Just wave your hand underneath the plants whilst you’re hoovering, any muck kicked up will zip into the syphon. You don’t want to stir the substrate up too much, some plants HATE having their roots disturbed!
You should never have to do a full strip down/clean unless you’re restarting the tank from scratch.