substrate for honey gourami ?

[clownbaby]

Heyo!

I am getting ready to increase my stocking pretty soon, and since I am doing a rescape of my 30 gallon (110 liters or so) aquarium, I figured now would be a good time to mix in some new substrate.

I've been reading up on honey gouramis and some sources say they will be super uncomfortable without a dark / black substrate, others say it doesn't matter as long as they are taken care of. So uh, which is it? Should I use dark substrate or does it not matter?

Additionally, I have snails and pygmy corydoras. Currently I am using a mix of pea gravel and sand, with pebbles to accent. Is there a substrate that works best for gouramis (gravel, pea gravel, sand, etc)? Would this conflict with my cories & snails? My favorite type of substrate is what I have currently (sand and pea gravel / coarse sand), and I am good with replacing this to a different color but I would really prefer to keep the substrate sand or pea gravel. Is this okay?

Thanks for helping!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Lennie]

Doesn't matter. But I feel like mine looked the best on JBL manado. Maybe Im making it up. I kept mine on Tropica aquasoil and beige fine sand too. No obvious changes in color. They are mainly top to mid dwellers anyway

[face]

 I’m using light sand they don’t seem to mind and there’s bubble nests everywhere lol

[Tony s]

On 5/1/2024 at 2:49 PM, clownbaby said:

Should I use dark substrate or does it not matter

There are fish that color-up or down depending on the substrate color. I don't believe honey gourami's do that. they may actually pop more on a dark background. the gold should shine. 

[macdaddy36]

I have them on light substrate and if I were to do it again I would use black sand. I don’t think it matters all that much to the fish, but I think they would stand out better on dark substrate.

[Scaperoot]

I have mine in a 20 long with black sand and a black background. I don't think it affects them much, but the color does pop for sure! Post a pic when you rescape🙂