# Deciding which substrate to use.



## andyjones8081 (11 mo ago)

I have come back to keeping an aquarium after several years without a tank, my previous tank is my profile picture. 
This time I am planning ahead to give me the aquascape I want from the start rather than repeated strip downs and rescape. 
The tank is a 5ft 400L tank with 75L sump tank to house heaters, filters, pumps etc. I am going to be dosing with liquid ferts and liquid carbon from a dosing pump. Water will be HMA filtered with auto top up and auto water change, which I had set up on my previous tank so I know it works well. I intend to do a loose Amazon clearwater biotope with plants and fish species only from south America rather than just the clearwater streams in the Amazon just to give me more options for both flora and fauna for a more interesting tank to look at.
Lighting is LED day/night light which I will add more LED lighting if needed. 
I'm intending to use an aqua soil to the sides of the tank which is where I'm planning on having the larger plants to hide the water inlet pipe work and the weir which will be covered in gravel, rocks and bogwood with a finer sand in the middle and to the front to home the mid and foreground plants.
Okay so that's the basic set up so onto my question. 
I'm torn between using ADA amazonia Aqua soil and Tetra complete substrate. I can't seem to see a huge difference in reviews but a MASSIVE difference in price. Although the cost of set up isn't my biggest concern when I'm looking at over £100 for the amount of substrate I would need for ADA whereas it's just over £50 for more than enough of the Tetra substrate I'm wondering if the difference in price is worth it?
Sorry for the long post
andy


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## mistergreen (Mar 3, 2007)

You can use multiple substrates to keep the price down. A thin bottom ADA or tetra layer for plants and the top layer can be inert attractive lava rock substrate or even sand.


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## andyjones8081 (11 mo ago)

mistergreen said:


> You can use multiple substrates to keep the price down. A thin bottom ADA or tetra layer for plants and the top layer can be inert attractive lava rock substrate or even sand.


I was planning on over covering with a course gravel on the soil substrate for visual appearance and the effect I'm looking for but is there any difference between the soil substrates or is there another alternative that people would recommend?


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## mistergreen (Mar 3, 2007)

It's up to you. People use garden soil but it comes with limitations. Look in the 'el natural' forum. You have Tropica in Europe. They make soil, I think.

ADA I think is good but too expensive from what I've read. I haven't used ADA or Tetra.


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## TetraFreak (Mar 15, 2006)

I currently use Fluorite RED as my substrate for the plants, but I am starting a remodel and I will be topping off the Fluorite with Black Fluorite Sand for a nice aesthetic look and to further the earth eating habits of some of the S.A. cichlids I may be adding.

Live plants love Fluorite and will grow like crazy with that and good lighting.

All my fish and plants are South American Natives and it's quite the peaceful tank.

best of luck!

-TF


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## andyjones8081 (11 mo ago)

TetraFreak said:


> I currently use Fluorite RED as my substrate for the plants, but I am starting a remodel and I will be topping off the Fluorite with Black Fluorite Sand for a nice aesthetic look and to further the earth eating habits of some of the S.A. cichlids I may be adding.
> 
> Live plants love Fluorite and will grow like crazy with that and good lighting.
> 
> ...


Thanks for the answer I'll look into it. I'm going to over cover with gravel and sand where I don't use soil as I want a sandy look rather than an earthy look.


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## andyjones8081 (11 mo ago)

Having done a bit more research and speaking to a local company that setup and maintain marine and tropical tanks I have decided to go with JBL Manado substrate.
I'm still going to be using a layering system to keep the substrate where I need it and to restrict plant growth and spread in areas I want to keep sandy. 
I will put up photos of my substrate set up as I do it.


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