Natural Color Aquarium Gravel Stone Black (5-8mm) 10kg

Natural black gravel for aquariums (5-8 mm) is the perfect way to decorate and enhance your aquarium, adding a variety of colors and interest to your tank. This gravel is suitable for all types of freshwater, tropical, and marine aquariums.

The gravel also acts as a good medium for rooting live plants. Perhaps the most important function that gravel performs is providing a habitat for beneficial bacteria. These bacterial colonies are essential for eliminating waste produced by fish, leftover food, and plant debris in the tank. If the bacteria do not have a comfortable gravel bed to live in, they will seek other places, but may not grow in sufficient quantities to keep the tank safe for your fish.

If the tank is left with a bare bottom, it will be necessary to change the water more frequently in the tank to prevent the accumulation of harmful waste. In the case of a crowded tank, frequent water changes may not be enough to keep ammonia and nitrite under control.

Sometimes there are situations where substrate is not necessary, or even desirable. The primary case is in a breeding tank used for egg hatching and raising Young. Breeding tanks should be kept strictly clean, requiring frequent water changes in addition to immediate cleaning of waste and uneaten food.

Young are so small that it is often difficult to distinguish them if they are on a gravel substrate. It is very easy for them to be sucked up during substrate cleaning, or when changing the water. A bare-bottom tank makes it very easy to see the Young, and thus avoid them during tank cleaning.

Hospital tanks may also not contain substrate, which can harbor parasites that may persist there and infect the next inhabitant. A bare-bottom tank is a good way to avoid this possibility. For the same reason, some owners choose to leave any quarantine tanks bare-bottomed as well.