Crosman airsoft glow in the dark bb's instead of gravel?

howdy folks i'm new to the forum and I want to see how helpful this site can be. i'm wanting to try these airsoft bb's in place of the gravel in my tank. it's only a ten gallon tank with a crayfish in it, and id like to add a little something to it. now here's my list of worries which are now questions for anyone here:

will these bb's toxify the water?
and
will my crayfish eat them?
and
can live plants root in it like gravel and grow?

ive tried to find out about the bb's toxicity, but there's noone at crosman who can answer that question. (go figure) and I really don't think the crayfish will eat them since I still have artificial plants in the tank and he has been in it for a few weeks, but I don't know for sure.
I think I have the tank pretty stable. its been set up for a while without anything living in it. now I want to add a spot of interest and these bb's would be great since theyre relativly cheap and easily availably, easy to clean, and a fairly close size to the gravel i'm using now. so, if anyone knows anything about this, i'd totally appreciate the help. and if it works it could become a nice little addition to betta tanks and the like. thanks Lee

 

I can't be 100% certain, not knowing their exact chemical makeup, but I think it's likely the bb's would leach toxic heavy metals into the water. The crayfish probably wouldn't eat them but if one got in on accident even, he'd be a goner. Plants would be able to live and grow in it - unless the roots were damaged/killed by anything leached from the bb's. You'd be the first person i've heard of using them for substrata, so it's uncharted water, but i'd not recommend using metal as a substrata.

Aside from the potential leaching issue, they could gain temperature from the tank lights and pass that on to you tank water, heating it and making the crayfish and plants less than happy from the temp.

If you're looking for gravel alternatives, they include things as varied as small glass marbles (flat or round) from crafts departments, silica sand or small tumbled river rocks.

 

I would be very concerned about the chemicals that make them glow in the dark. I suspect that it may be harmful. I had some glow in the dark pebbles in one of my tanks before that didn't do any harm, but they were specifically for aquariums, these bbs are not.

 

thanks for the advice and everything folks. to the flbettacouple, I am talking about using plastic airsoft bb's so i'm not worried about heavy metal syndromes, but I think i'm just goin to experiment with some feeder fish in a betta tank and see if they live for a while. I tried to find the chemical make-up of the bb's and best as I can't see its just plastic and a phospheresent powder added to it. I know know if the plastic is water proof tho so I'm not sure its a true seal around the powder. and I haven't looked into the temperature issues but I can't see how they would hold heat any different than the marbles I'm using now. I jsut want to lay a layer under the marbles and see it I can get a underside light effect for the time that the lights are on in the tank. the bb's only hold a charge for about 10 minutes max unless exposed to the blacklight shine. then they sparkle and with a small blacklight underneath my tank in the base it could be a new . . . ummm...... "fad"? continuing on and I will keep ya'll updated. Lee

 

You should be fine with those...of course, being round, it might just drive the cray crazy, when they try and redecorate. LOL I got some plastic shells from the LFS and threw them in with my cray. She loves to move them around the tank and bury herself under them. Of course...she moves anything in the tank, including the gravel. LOL

 

Oh yes those cray are industrious aren't they. I knew someone who used the bb's spinkled in a guppy tank. They lived just fine.

 

They should be fine, just make sure they aren't the biodegradeable kind, that could end up in messed up water quality. I used to have them in a ten gallon without any bad effect, and there are probably 500 of them sitting in the bottom of my pond because it was fun to shoot the waterfall when I first got my gun, I shot everything.

 

there are a lot of other safe alternets ...and you can get gravel in all different colors...and those glow in the dark bbs wouldnt glow very long..I have a plant the glows in the dark...{I didnt buy it because of that} and it glows for a few minutes and then fades into the tank like anyother plant..and once you get a chemical in the water...you lucky if you can get it out...dont mess with things your not certin about

 

I have no idea if you can buy this or not but if you can I really want one. In one of my Genetics classes I saw a new plant. I was just a weed that a lab took and Xenotransplantated with the DNA of a firefly. In affect the plant veins glowed. It was amazing looking, I wonder if they have come out with that in an aquatic plant. Hummmm.

 

I was just thinking who needs glow in the dark sub straight when you can have the plants do it for you and they don’t ever stop.

 

I'm not really OK with Genetic Alterations. Why do we need to make glowing plants? What purpose do they serve?

 

Well, maybe they could be street lights for the cockroaches after we obliterate ourselves. .. Seriously, I think the reason we're doing stuff like that is just so we can play God and see what happens when we play with DNA. It's like a toybox for an immature human race.

I'm not really OK with Genetic Alterations. Why do we need to make glowing plants? What purpose do they serve?

 

Well, maybe they could be street lights for the cockroaches after we obliterate ourselves. .. Seriously, I think the reason we're doing stuff like that is just so we can play God and see what happens when we play with DNA. It's like a toybox for an immature human race.

A serious case of God Complex for sure.

 

Dude . . . glowing plants would be awesome.

 

Dude . . . glowing plants would be awesome.

I understand what you mean, I just think it's wrong to manipulate nature like that. My inner hippy I guess. I think people would do better to try to go with nature instead of always fighting it or twisting it. It feels to me like we are trying to prove our dominance over the Earth. Anyway, just a thought.

 

:;z OK OK OK, you guys are all missing the point, on TV the other day they had a special about GLOW IN THE DARK CATS!!!

My question is why isn't someone (and they probably are) working on glow in the dark fish. I know there really are those out there, and given the justified response the folks here have on tattooing and painted fish, I can just see where this would go..........But

 

oops didn't mean to start something

 

They're not glow in the dark cats, they're fluorescent cats. There's a difference. (the scientists have been making this distinction.)
I agree that people are just playing with this stuff because they got a grant and want to see what they can do.

 

fluorescent cats, huh? can I get them to make me a fluorescent dog?

 

Airsoft BBs float. My .20 and .12 ones do anyway. My bad if yours dont. I duno abotu the toxicity though. Just don't use biodegradeable that's for sure.