ADA soil over Lapis sand

[eddyq]

It is all right to place ADA Amazonia soil over lapis sands to create a high slope? Like a rockscape (Iwagumi). Can this be done at all, anyone try this before, please share.

Thanks in advance.

[brianclaw]

No problems with this, but I'd think placing the Aquasoil below the Lapis is a better idea. The grains are smaller and will make planting a lot easier, unless you're going for the powder form of Aquasoil.

[cheetf]

Bro please plan carefully your scape. Once one soil goes over another that is it. Permanent already until tank total redo. That's because you will have a very hard time separating the different types of substrate and it can look rather ugly.

[kemp]

wouldn't that cause the lapis to drop into the gaps created by Aquasoil?
But anyway i would advise not to mix using them, really kind of messy

No problems with this, but I'd think placing the Aquasoil below the Lapis is a better idea. The grains are smaller and will make planting a lot easier, unless you're going for the powder form of Aquasoil.

[|squee|]

Will look messy if you uproot anything. I'd go for pure of either.

[e-mini]

You can use bigger sized pebble to create the slope first. Then finish off with ADA or lapis on top.

[Goondoo]

You can use bigger sized pebble to create the slope first. Then finish off with ADA or lapis on top.

Actually, how about laying the lapis as desired, then put a layer of old news paper (or any cleaner paper if material is a concern), wet it a little so it become more firm, follow by the layer of ADA?

For a big tank, it could save quite a lot.

[valice]

But it will break down in time and when the roots penetrates through the newspaper into the bottom layer, during uproot, the roots will bring up some of the bottom soil or lapis with it... So still might not be a good idea...

[cawanmushi]

Not sure about this. Let say if use ADA Amazonia soil which is dark color and lapis sand is mixture of white n other color ..Is it the color mixture not that nice when uproot if all the lapis sand scatter all around the ADA?

[StanChung]

Not good idea to have the lapis on top as the lapis is heavier.
Have done the large gravel the aquasoil on top. Use a thin layer of gravel[like laying powersand ]

The other way was to lay and plant everything on lapis, then pour some Aquasoil on top. Be mindful to pull up the plants a bit after this so that the growth shoots area are exposed to light.

This worked for me because I have a rock retainer that blocks everythng from sight. So even if the thing mixed it was out of sight.

A word of caution is if you ever top up Aquasoil, if a lot- i'd recommend you do water change of 10-20% every other day for a week because of the NH3. A lot of my shrimps bought it and I was perplexed as to the cause until I noticed the classic ammonia poisoning in the fish. red gills etc.

.

[valice]

But I thought ADA Aquasoil is supposed to trap NH3?

[StanChung]

Aquasoil slowly releases it, great for fishless cycle.