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Premoistened Kitty Litter
>It would seem that washing the kitty litter prior to use would remove
one of
>the biggest negative points to using this substance - its habit of
fouling
>the water column with colloidal clay particles when disturbed. Is there
a
>reason for recommending that kitty litter NOT be washed prior to using
it in
>a substrate?
>
>Would any of the "kitty litter brigade" care to comment? Do any of you
wash
>your litter prior to use? Would doing so affect/remove anything
valuable
>from the material?
I used kitty litter several times, On it's own I don't really like it,
as uprooting creates a awful mess. getting it wet before hand I
actually reccomend! Getting the stuff saturated with water BEFORE you
put the gravel on top of it is necessary, because otherwise the stuff
swells and causes dips and hills in your lovely substrate as it expands
when it takes on water. (I had a 2" layer turn into a 3 1/2 to 4"
hellish mess.) This made a teardown almost 100% necessary, as the gravel
was uneven and the water had gone all cloudy from exposed areas.
Now when I use it in a subsrate (I use it for clay balls too) I mix it
with other substances. Currently I'm only using it on a ten gallon
setup using equal parts of sand, kitty litter (premoistened) and peat
moss, (with a little bit of micronized iron, and dolomite for ph
reasons) I haven't had any differences in plant growth from
premoistened kitty litter, I don't think it makes much difference at
all.
Hope this helps,
Kevin
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