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Hi all

I'm Brianna and I'm (obviously) new here... I've read around a bit but I'm still relatively clueless so I figured this is the right place to ask my overall questions.
Welcome to the forums! I'm not "new" but im not nearly as active as everyone else on here.
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I have a 29G tank with my gorgeous Ryukin, Suna Solar, inside of it. He currently has 3 snails (there were 4 last night...do not know where he disappeared to) and some sad-looking bamboo inside of his tank.
I current am running a 29g with 1 blackmoor, 1 oranda and 2 platies that is planted. I do also own a bamboo. I currently have Rotala Indica, Cryptocoyne Wendti, and Amazon Swords. These plants survive with my golfish and do not get eaten! I started the tank with these plants as well as Blyxa Japonica, Golden Creeping Jenny, and Water Sprite, however they have gotten eaten via the goldies. The goldies didn't actually bother the Blyxa Japonica, however they did uproot them nearly every day. After weeks of fighting the goldies on these plants the constant uprooting killed the plants.
My bamboo is doing quite well and is showing no signs of rotting. The top of it is out of water, but 90% of the bamboo is submerged within the tank.
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SO...I have the most questions about substrate, so I'll start with that.
I use a black sand substrate because when I saw him at the store, he definitely ate a piece of gravel (I did NOT see him spit it out any time after) and I figured that was the only thing I could go with to prevent a blockage. He's about 4-4.5" right now and only going to get bigger, so I can't imagine all the gravel he'd eat if I went with anything I've seen in the stores ( other than river rock -_-;; )
I would really really like to do some sort of dirt to make it look as natural as possible, but I was wondering... what kind of dirt do you even use for an aquarium? And is there anything that I can use to put on top of it (in non-planted areas) in order to make cleaning easier? Suna gets Peas and Spirulina tablets (has a mixture of shrimp, blood worms, etc. in it) and also dried blood worms every now and then. That being said, cleaning up his leftovers he leaves behind is not an easy task with sand.
I also would like to know the dangers of leaving substrate uncycled. I had read about people talking about getting some sort of problems if there are pockets anywhere where the water is not filtering through? Overall I am completely lost on any of that so I would love as much information as possible!
I also use black sand that i picked up from petco. Depending on your fish, if he did eat the gravel, you should have seen it being passed otherwise he may have spit out without you eating it. I've never seen many goldies actually eat their gravel and survive which makes me think your little guy did spit it out, though all of my goldies in the past usually die due to SBD by the time they hit about 3.5".
As for dirt substrate, you might want to stick with sand in all honesty. Goldies like to sift. Dirt is not the greatest thing to have with goldies as you'll constantly get a wonderful ploom of dirt floating around due to them.
However since you really want it, im not going to be the person who says dont use it and leave it at that. Some dirt that you can look into using is Mircale Grow Organic Choice Potting
MIX - not the soil, but mix. I am actually contemplating about adding a soil layer to my tank, however i just added a Fluval 305 filter so i have to wait for that bad boy to get cycled and up and running before i mess around any more.
When you add the soil, and are ready to fill up the tank, make sure you add a plastic sheet down ontop of the soil as this will disrupt the water and not screw up your soil (create a massive hole in it and throw soil everywhere).
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Now...algae... I've had a significant amount of algae growth in poor Suna's tank recently. I have to scrub it every other day, but all of his rocks and his plants just get caked with it. :/ I've recently placed the snails inside, so I'm hoping they will help, but is there any plant-safe treatments for algae? (Are we all just doomed? lol)
Last question though... plants! I've found that as long as I can place them in deep enough, Suna isn't too bothered with pulling anything out, but he DOES have a field day going through them so I would like to know some plants that would root strong enough to take a fat Ryukin scratching his back on them.

A general list of things to look for would be ideal. His tank is NOT heated, also, so plants that would do well in cold water is a must.
...That should be it.

Thank you so much, in advance.
What kind of algae are you seeing? I've been battling algae myself for quite some time. I have been experimenting with H202 and have seen NO side affects of using it and am starting to use it in my 10g aquaponics tank.
H202 has been the main forefront of killing algae within my tank and i have been winning the battle(slowly) over the past month. I used to have quite a bit of green algae on the glass and all of the decor inside the tank was covered in algae. I recently pulled all items out of the tank, and did a soak in a 5gallon bucket with some h202 for 24hours then scrubbed clean and let dry for 24hours prior to returning to the tank. So far the growth of algae has been stopped and i was seeing reversing signs prior to the cleanse.
I would say you first need to figure out what exactly is causing your algae problem first, and make changes to combat the problem before attempting to find a remedy for removing it.
I removed the 17w fluoro that came with the tank and put in 4 24w CFL's which made my tank a high light tank. This was a number one contribution to my algae problem and the second was my filter was a zoomed 511 canister. Its designed for turtle tanks, however it worked fine for fish that aren't high in producing waste.
Please keep in mind that H202 in aquariums are quite...experimental and use with caution. I have read many scientific articles about it and i personally use a doseage of 1ml-1.5ml per gallon of water. It has been seen upwards of 3ml per gallon is safe, however i would rather play on the safe side of things.
Would oyu be able to upload photos? If you have photos of your algae that would also help the members give advice on what to do/what is wrong.
What kind of filtration are you using? What are your parameters of the tank?