Cleaning old aquarium gravel

[CACAdmin]

I took a lot of gravel out of my 'nano-pond' this year as I've set it up differently. It of course sat there over the winter and was detritus laden as well as with MTS shells (left after their demise over the winter).

I don't have plans to use it right away but would like to clean and disinfect it for future use in a tank. What is the most efficient way of doing this?

[Gobies et al]

I suggest - rinse well to remove as much organics from it, soak in a potassium permanganate solution minimum 8 hrs, rinse again, and dry - clean and disinfected.

:Smile:

[Namor]

I've seen mention of using vinegar or bleach, but have no experience with either. I use a large stock pot to boil anything needing sterilization. It has also worked well for pre-soaking driftwood. I'm also afforded the luxury of being able to rinse things like sponges, filter parts etc. directly from my tap water, as my sand point well contains no man made nasties. I have also noticed that since switching from RO water, and going completely with aged (24hr.) tap water the overall health in my tanks seems to have improved. As an example-
In the time I used RO there were 0 births and a few casualties.
In the 8 or 9 month period since then, only 1 fish has died (lockjaw) and have witnessed several births/spawns.

[CACAdmin]

Thanks, Gerry. I debated whether to rinse it as clean as possible and then lay it all out to be baked in the sun would kill off the nasties but was concerned that would not be sufficient.

Namor, I had thought about bleach but was concerned about residue on the gravel... and don't have a huge pot to boil it in or I probably would have done that... boiling long enough would kill just about anything, I'm sure.

[plecmom]

What I've done is soak the rocks in a 1/10 ratio of vinegar and water for 10 min. Then rinse well. Soak the rocks over night with plain water and some reg. water conditioner. After its been 24 hours... rinse, rinse, rinse using a strainer and your done. I've done this many many times as I've bought used rocks and never had issues with dieing fish or ph problems etc.

[blainep]

I tend to just give used gravel a good rinsing to get the 'goo' off of it then scald it with hot water.
To scald, I boil a large pot of water and dump it over the gavel (in a bucket), give a stir and let it sit for a while to cool off.

[CACAdmin]

Thanks for all the ideas everyone. Blaine, your idea sounds like the most inexpensive route to go. Boiling water ought to kill any nasties in there. I think I'll go that route.

[blainep]

It works well for smaller tanks, for a large tank it might be painfully slow method

[CACAdmin]

Good point Blaine. For a large amount, it could take forever with the boiling water. As I only have an ice cream bucket full to clean in this case, it shouldn't take too long (but as you can see, I haven't gotten to it yet... maybe later today... I'm great at procrastinating... it's one of my special talents.:laugh: )