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Your loach is doing exactly what he'd be doing in the wild, so no harm done.
Gravel and sand have pretty much no CEC. They can work fine as substrates as long as you are faithful and consistent with dosing the water column with ferts. Carpeting plants don't tend to fill in nearly as quickly or thickly with no nutrients in the subtstrate, but you can make it work.
I personally prefer subrates with nutrient content as I hate fooling with water column dosing. But that's just personal preference.
Gravel and sand have pretty much no CEC. They can work fine as substrates as long as you are faithful and consistent with dosing the water column with ferts. Carpeting plants don't tend to fill in nearly as quickly or thickly with no nutrients in the subtstrate, but you can make it work.
I personally prefer subrates with nutrient content as I hate fooling with water column dosing. But that's just personal preference.