SCUGrad

I was just looking at some of the INCREDIBLE looking tanks some people have here. I noticed that some of them are heavily planted and have lots of rocks, etc. and they look totally awesome.

My question is: given that, how in the world do these folks vacuum their gravel?

MizRamzi

Stir it then vacuum or just vacuum around the plants. Don't worry about not getting it all. Water plants need fertilizer too

I love planted tanks. Check mine out!

Alasse

I do not gravel clean my heavily planted at all

GouramiGirl1221

I always just vacuum around my plants. The way I have mine done keeps most of the plants in the back, so I just kind of run the vac over the surface of the gravel in the back and really dig in and get all the way down the the bottom of the tank in the front.

dvc_r

My LFS summed it up nicely:
"The more plants... the less vacuuming."

MissMTS

I don't vacuum my heavily planted tanks. The plants use the fish poo for nutrients. Its one of the things I love about planted tanks, lol.

dvc_r

Totally agree!

That's what got me started with plants (besides all the eco friendly stuff). Then I found that plants are like a hobby within a hobby. Now all my tanks are filled with plants and just like getting the right balance of community fish, I spend just as much time trying to get the right balance of plants.