Dexter Posted December 25, 2012 Report Share Posted December 25, 2012 Hi Guys. After Googling a bit and looking at pics on here I notice that alot of You guys have bare bottom in your Flowerhorn Tanks. Does this really help bring out the colour? The reason for asking is I bought a Red Dragon and have been growing it up for a couple of weeks (curently about 8cm) and have noticed that it has stayed fairly Dark. It is in a tank on his own with Black Gravel and (until today) Black background. It was my old RCS tank. My little brother bought 2 from the same batch but has White Gravel and his have nice Red Fins. Should I change my gravel colour or remove it completely? or am I too late? here is a pic. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Betta-Cray_z Posted December 25, 2012 Report Share Posted December 25, 2012 its never too late, it will not stay that colour. i usually treat them as i would any other american. the idea is to not make the gravel to light or too dark. i usually use river sand or pool filter sand and it works like a charm. also what are you feeding? the fish's diet can affect it colour too! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dexter Posted December 25, 2012 Author Report Share Posted December 25, 2012 99.9999% hikari food sticks. With the odd RCS just for fun. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Matmatmat Posted December 25, 2012 Report Share Posted December 25, 2012 I agree with using lighter gravel will help. I would add some lighter gravel to the dark stuff you have, to get a balence.. Also putting a blue background on will help! Food makes a big difference also, get some massivore , food sticks and nls and even maybe some hai feng (or something with lots of astax) feeding a varied diet is a good idea! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dexter Posted December 25, 2012 Author Report Share Posted December 25, 2012 So:- All white is a NO GO? All Black is a NO GO? Mixed is OK? Sand(Which I am not keen on) is OK too? I will try the lighter gravel thing tomorrow. Hopefully it works for me. :s Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Matmatmat Posted December 25, 2012 Report Share Posted December 25, 2012 I haven't uses sand or all white.. But if others have and had success then cool:) Be carefull taking all the gravel out at once , stirring up crap and creating a spike.. I would remove some and mix some lighter stuff in with it.. Guess its just like creating a balence too white and it MAY wash th color out, too dark and the FH goes dark. This is only my experience, HTH Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
angry Posted December 25, 2012 Report Share Posted December 25, 2012 Don't know about others but I have mostly bare bottomed tanks mainly for the ease of cleaning... I have up to four dividers in each tank at times and it is much easier to clean (efficiently) if you can see what your sucking up Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dexter Posted December 27, 2012 Author Report Share Posted December 27, 2012 (edited) Added some white Gravel and Removed the Background. Seems to look a bit better today. Here some pics Before & After Edited December 27, 2012 by Dexter Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kasman Posted December 31, 2012 Report Share Posted December 31, 2012 wow thats quite a bit of colour difference. Iv had bare bottom but crap floating around annoyed me. So have been going with a scattering of light coloured gravel. No difference in fish colour really. medium/light blue background usually works well too. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
