Moving reef to new tank with no cycle

[Mr.L3wis]

Hello everyone. I had to take down my 75gallon and 20 gallon reef tanks. I bought a new nuvo lagoon 25. Used sand and rock from the 20 gallon that was well established. Everything else is the tank (skimmer,filter sock) is new. Because of the moving situation I was not able to set up the we tank and cycle it until the day I tore down the established tanks. All livestock went into the 25 the day it was set up. ( 2 days ago ). 9 fish and 25+ frags were added the night it was set up. This was 2 days ago and I expected a cycle even using old sand and rock. But this was really my only option. So my question is, does anyone have an experience similar to this one. I'm going to just keep doing prime and doing water changes. Fish are all still alive, lots most of my acro and some chalice during the whole ordeal but everything else seems to be getting comfortable. Any suggestions other than water changes and prime?

 

[Maggie321]

If you used the old rock and did not let it dry out, you may not have a cycle... The beneficial bacteria is on the surface area of the rock and sand. Not in the water. Keep testing to watch for ammonia spike and be ready to do a big WC if it rises. Good luck!

 

[Dr. Dendrostein]

Hello everyone. I had to take down my 75gallon and 20 gallon reef tanks. I bought a new nuvo lagoon 25. Used sand and rock from the 20 gallon that was well established. Everything else is the tank (skimmer,filter sock) is new. Because of the moving situation I was not able to set up the we tank and cycle it until the day I tore down the established tanks. All livestock went into the 25 the day it was set up. ( 2 days ago ). 9 fish and 25+ frags were added the night it was set up. This was 2 days ago and I expected a cycle even using old sand and rock. But this was really my only option. So my question is, does anyone have an experience similar to this one. I'm going to just keep doing prime and doing water changes. Fish are all still alive, lots most of my acro and some chalice during the whole ordeal but everything else seems to be getting comfortable. Any suggestions other than water changes and prime?

Should take 7-10 to cycle still

 

[brandon429]

We have a giant thread on skip cycling, boils down to this

If you move no cloud, no detritus, there's no recycle. The specific biology is that transferring cycled surfaces isn't antimicrobial

Only moving half rotten protein stores liberates enough ammonia overcome bacteria in some transfers, it was never the loss of current transfers

So the cleaner you install the new tank, up to fully clean with no cloudy sand and no cloud that can be shaken from rocks, that's specifically the mechanism that guarantees no ammonia in the new setup. Wheregoes detritus goes the recycle, it's the sole locus of concern

If you took pics of that, or can put together a nice summary w pics of how your move went it would be neat to see how much waste you got away with moving

The system is so reliable we never ever use prime for twelve pages, we just skip cycle move and clean tanks in the sand rinse thread

 

[brandon429]

Also

In those details exists one repeatable cure among many for cyano, should the need for a decisive win become required


How different is a take apart full cleaning of a currently misbehaving reef vs moving one across town vs upgrading one in the home

all the moves are equal, they aren't antibacterial as the substrates always stay wet. Rinsing live rocks externally in saltwater, and the sandbed in freshwater that way we have unlimited rinse time, isn't antimicrobial (short duration, then the sand is rinsed in saltwater, then reef put back notice the order).

Cleaning, moving, upgrading are simply intercept points for detritus, or anytime someone has a cyano problem

This takes away all cyano feed, and mass, in one pass

Only practical for nano reefs... large tanks are too hard to part clean.

But a nano can have a snowglobe sandbed and clear rocks, which is the opposite of being cyano invaded, anytime you will that to occur. The same science that allows you to move the rocks, or Tampa bay saltwater to mail them skip cycle across the us, allows you to opt out of ever having any form of matted invader as long as you are working with a nano reef.

Imagine cyano trying to take a foothold here

or dinos

that's tap water... The final rinse is in saltwater then your substrate is brand new again.

That nano is twelve years old, it doesn't look twelve.

Rinsing makes your reef ageless, it's the secret fountain of youth. Detritus is the sole locus and cause for old tank syndrome and for the ammonia events associated with moving aquariums when all fish are accounted for, it's so reliable that we never use any form of ammonia offsets in this thread below. This is twelve pages of skip cycle work using other people's tanks as the testbed.
https://www.reef2reef.com/threads/the-official-sand-rinse-thread-aka-one-against-many.230281/page-13

In my opinion that thread puts alot of money on the line, imagine if we crashed all those reefs. drummed out

Every job: how do we isolate the sensitives from the detritus and put back together minus detritus. That's it. There's no other secret, how else can each page have the same outcome
If you moved the old bed or rocks without rinsing, then I guess you ran it pretty clean before the move. Moving, upgrading, downgrading, adding sand, removing sand, curing matted invaders, mailing substrates, rinsing a sandbed, all the same move. You can move clean substrates around all day without harm, only the cloud of detritus brings harm

 

[Mr.L3wis]

Tank move went successful for the most part. When I filled the tank I used a new salt ( red sea coral pro)
And the all levels swung more than I had intended. I lost alot of Los and mostly all sps. Softies were fine. I didn't battle a small cycle but like I said, no fish or inverts lost.