Moving reef/fish combos

[Amy406]

Hoping for some good positive advice, I’m in a situation where the people who are buying our house need to be in it before the house that we are buying is ready for us to move in. I’m thinking it is unsafe to move my 10G cube and 90 twice within three and eight weeks. My gut tells me to ask the owner of my new house whether it would be OK to just move my aquariums into the house and only move the aquariums once but my husband thinking it might be better to just move them to my daughters house and then when our house is ready, go ahead and move the aquariums to the new house. I feel like this would cause incredible stress to everyone in the tanks including the tanks themselves, stand and equipment. I think two moves would definitely affect my bioload. Always hear that going with your gut instinct is the right one. Move the aquariums to the new house early and avoid the stress of a second move. My 10G cube is a year and a half established and my 90 is almost exactly one year established Any advice?

 

[ThatsNoMoon]

Maybe see how long your daughter would be willing to house the tanks? It could give your tank some time to recover between moves.

If you move the fish tank into the new house and someone there uses an air freshener, window cleaner or whatever then you'll lose them all anyway.
A thing to remember is nobody will ever care as much about your hobby as you do so others will do what's in their own best interest (e.g spraying window cleaners, air fresheners for rooms, bleach mop too close to tank ect) without regard for your tank.

 

[ZoWhat]

Pre-covid there were Frag Swaps all the time.

I live in Ohio and talked to Frag Swap guys who almost every other weekend would transport their Sales Booth full of expensive corals hundreds of miles in their Vans 2, 3 times a month, year round.

Jut smthg to think about.....

 

[Amy406]

Maybe see how long your daughter would be willing to house the tanks? It could give your tank some time to recover between moves.

If you move the fish tank into the new house and someone there uses an air freshener, window cleaner or whatever then you'll lose them all anyway.
A thing to remember is nobody will ever care as much about your hobby as you do so others will do what's in their own best interest (e.g spraying window cleaners, air fresheners for rooms, bleach mop too close to tank ect) without regard for your tank.

Darn hadn’t thought about air fresheners, window cleaners, and bleachers. Tanks would definitely be in danger at my daughters house. Definitely a good point. Thank you for bringing that up.

 

[Amy406]

Pre-covid there were Frag Swaps all the time.

I live in Ohio and talked to Frag Swap guys who almost every other weekend would transport their Sales Booth full of expensive corals hundreds of miles in their Vans 2, 3 times a month, year round.

Jut smthg to think about.....

This is vary true.

 

[207Meg]

Do you have any good aquarium service companies in the area? One in my area does tank boarding services. Like when you bring your dog to a pet sitter for vacation, they do it for your tank. It costs, but saves on worry and stress.

 

[Amy406]

Do you have any good aquarium service companies in the area? One in my area does tank boarding services. Like when you bring your dog to a pet sitter for vacation, they do it for your tank. It costs, but saves on worry and stress.

We have two fish/ reef stores. One does not have the room and the other is taking advantage of the pandemic and having work done on their building. But would have been a great idea

 

[brandon429]

If you don’t mind the physical work it is literally harmless to move any reef as much as you want *if you move it a certain way. We have a forty page work thread documenting successful tank moves and it works if you moved a reef once a month for its entire life, there’s a way to move reefs biologically that works across all reefs-only the physical part is hard. The moving safely template is already set so if you have a need for a double move let’s add it to page forty one

we can protect your bioload fully each time. These are reef storm simulation events is why it’s not harmful, upsets in nature are accounted for in adaptability. We clean your reef a certain way when it’s taken apart is why they all survive, it’s the unclean systems left dirty due to bacteria concern that die. Our thread is forty pages of clean moved reefs.

 

[Amy406]

If you don’t mind the physical work it is literally harmless to move any reef as much as you want *if you move it a certain way. We have a forty page work thread documenting successful tank moves and it works if you moved a reef once a month for its entire life, there’s a way to move reefs biologically that works across all reefs-only the physical part is hard. The moving safely template is already set so if you have a need for a double move let’s add it to page forty one

we can protect your bioload fully each time. These are reef storm simulation events is why it’s not harmful, upsets in nature are accounted for in adaptability. We clean your reef a certain way when it’s taken apart is why they all survive, it’s the unclean systems left dirty due to bacteria concern that die. Our thread is forty pages of clean moved reefs.

Thank you so much, I will look for that thread and read over it. I think at This point my biggest concern is the sand. I think I’m just gonna remove it completely and attempt to wash it and then put it into a quarantine tank until I believe that it’s is safe trying to avoid as much Algae and other harmful problems as I can. At least eight weeks. Also thinking that that quarantine time to you it good way to rebuild the bioload. After that I’ll keep a good eye on my acro‘s and anemones and try to keep as little stress on my fish as possible. Little worried about the stress on my aquarium in the stand. Hoping to avoid the stress on those also. Thank you for all this information to help me towards a successful path

 

[brandon429]

This has strong patterns for consideration

Official Sand Rinse and Tank Transfer thread

I am fairly worried about moving my freshwater setup as it is fairly overstocked (reduces aggression as no one fish gets singled out). I did fail to think about the toxicity of nitrite on top of ammonia toxicity... Here is my plan for the cichlid tank. I have gradually reduced my pH from 8.2 to...

www.reef2reef.com

the main highlight everyone misses in moves is light acclimation


each new setup is a new light ramp, the bleaching people get from tank moves and sand rinsing isn’t from bacteria being removed, its due to light bleaching - no full power shines until a week or so later.

rinsing sand a hundred times over is what we do above, there is no overdoing there is only underdoing

use tap water every single time you rinse sand until it’s snow globe clean grains. Final rinse is ro.


if you move clean systems and ramp lights we could get to page one hundred above and outcomes w be the same take pics if possible of all this work! We are simulating how you would be moving your reef to a MACNA convention and back, and then again, with these arrangements. And nobody at MACNA loses moved instant skip cycle reefs. The only bacteria any reef needs are the live rocks so those are cleaned in old saltwater before packing for the move. The sandbed bacteria are not needed and don’t need ramped down, the lighting does we show above


what I like most about tank relocation biology is if we take every common rule for reefing and reverse it, that’s what works best.

I know it sounded hyperbole when I said a reef could be moved monthly and not be harmed...just now my nano was getting cruddy from bulk feeding and I cleaned it all with a full water change, refill to bring up more wastes, drain again, and refill again with all new water. That’s 200% change in one sitting. My corals are sixteen years old, the reef doesn’t care if I do this weekly, bi weekly, monthly, and it wouldn’t know if I was relocating it while being drained. These are simulated reef storms *but they’re detritus free* which is why no tank dies. Only detritus and nonramp light can kill your relocation goals.

 

[Amy406]

This has strong patterns for consideration

Official Sand Rinse and Tank Transfer thread

I am fairly worried about moving my freshwater setup as it is fairly overstocked (reduces aggression as no one fish gets singled out). I did fail to think about the toxicity of nitrite on top of ammonia toxicity... Here is my plan for the cichlid tank. I have gradually reduced my pH from 8.2 to...

www.reef2reef.com

the main highlight everyone misses in moves is light acclimation


each new setup is a new light ramp, the bleaching people get from tank moves and sand rinsing isn’t from bacteria being removed, its due to light bleaching - no full power shines until a week or so later.

rinsing sand a hundred times over is what we do above, there is no overdoing there is only underdoing

use tap water every single time you rinse sand until it’s snow globe clean grains. Final rinse is ro.


if you move clean systems and ramp lights we could get to page one hundred above and outcomes w be the same take pics if possible of all this work! We are simulating how you would be moving your reef to a MACNA convention and back, and then again, with these arrangements. And nobody at MACNA loses moved instant skip cycle reefs. The only bacteria any reef needs are the live rocks so those are cleaned in old saltwater before packing for the move. The sandbed bacteria are not needed and don’t need ramped down, the lighting does we show above


what I like most about tank relocation biology is if we take every common rule for reefing and reverse it, that’s what works best.

I know it sounded hyperbole when I said a reef could be moved monthly and not be harmed...just now my nano was getting cruddy from bulk feeding and I cleaned it all with a full water change, refill to bring up more wastes, drain again, and refill again with all new water. That’s 200% change in one sitting. My corals are sixteen years old, the reef doesn’t care if I do this weekly, bi weekly, monthly, and it wouldn’t know if I was relocating it while being drained. These are simulated reef storms *but they’re detritus free* which is why no tank dies. Only detritus and nonramp light can kill your relocation goals.

A lot of really good information, I wasn’t really thinking about the sand clouds that would take a couple days to settle. Definitely gonna have to go through this within the next three weeks before we moving. Thank you so much for all this advice.

 

[brandon429]

Yes agreed prep in such a way there is zero clouding at all, and no settle time whatsoever. That’s the sole mechanism we need controlled for infinite safe moves. Every single job in the thread is an hours long tap water rinse of the sand, tap water will save your reef for the ultimate in reef irony

I knew that if I led with tap water being able to save your reef that would sound crazy without massive context logged