peat moss

[solar-ton]

i just got a new 20 gallon and i think im gonna use peat as a substrate-since i might have a few killis-and i was wondering if any of you guys can tell me where i can get some cause the peat at agway and such has a lot of chemicals in it that will cause dieseases even worse than cancer and i need soemthing that will bring the ph down to about 6.2 for the choclate gouramis so does anyone have any ideas on where i can get some?

[Damon]

Ok was all in one sentence?

You can get Canadian Sphagnum peat moss from any nursery or Home Depot. I am curious as to why this post is in the aquatic plants section.

[solar-ton]

it had to do with my plants to tough oh and btw will the peat sink or do i need to float it for a week?

[Damon]

Peat by itself won't work.

[solar-ton]

okay what else should i put in with it?

[MyraVan]

Nutural tank enthusiasts use soil + gravel substrates. Lots of people have had success by combining ordinary topsoil with peat, about 1 to 1.5" of this, and then 1" of small grain plain gravel.

You should expect that your water will be heavily stained dark yellow or brown for quite a few months after you start up a tank using this substrate. From my experience with soil + gravel substrates, the more organic matter you have in your soil, the more tannins (the stuff that turns your water yellow or brown) you will get, and the darker your water will be. That's why I tend to use as my soil mix 50% cheap topsoil, which has a medium amount of organic material, and 50% aquatic soil, which has almost no organic material. Peat is pretty much 100% organic material, so your water will be quite dark, unless you use carbon in your filter to get it out.

[Mr Aquarium]

Just for the record, Peat is for lowering PH in water.....You have a couple ways to use it, one is boil it a bit before you filter water through it, to get the bugs n nastys out
"which it can have"
Or set up a drip system and pour hot water thought it and set it up so it filters through the peat and not just run over it.....
In eather case will turn the water of tank a tea color "think that;s what I was told"
then delcor it then add the water to tank, this will nock a PH WAY down, I don;t have the email up but i wanna say it was around 7.7 down to 5.5 i remember...
You can get it any home n garden store for a few bucks......
So using it as a substrate wouldn't gain anything but a cloudy buggy tank....and prolly sitting in your tank like that would drop the PH farther I would guess........