Moving tank

Tjohnson8057 · Dec 5, 2014

I'm going to be moving in a few months and obviously my tank is coming with me. I've only been in the hobby a few years so I still have ALOT to learn. The tank that I'm moving is my first tank and it has Been running for about a 1 1/2 years. It's a 100g quarter round. Live stock and coral are mixed but I would say on the low side as far as tank size to livestock ratio goes. The distance of the move will be around a 2 hour drive give or take. I live in fl so I don't know what the weather will be, but I know it won't be snowing lol. Ive also been wanting to go bigger and to a rectangle tank and was thinking that this would be a good opportunity to make that jump. I'm trying to get a game plan on the move and I would GREATLY appreciate and advice or tips to make things go smooth.

143MPCo · Dec 5, 2014

The easiest way would to be to use a few brute trash cans to place everything in for the move, I would add a battery operated oxygen pump to keep the water aerated. Cold or not you don't want to temp dropping to much so a cheap temp probe would also be useful. if you have a power inverter use it for a heater.

Outside the two hour drive, you must consider the time to pull everything apart, put it into whatever containers you go with, load it all up, and start your drive... might be more like 4-6hrs by the time your done.

Best way is to have (if possible) a tank at the new location up and ready for you to move everything in.

Tjohnson8057 · Dec 5, 2014

Ya, that's along the lines of what I was thinking about doing. I didn't think of the inverter for a heater tho. With having another tank set up to where I'm moving. Would I want to have set up where I just use my water and have some made to fill in the rest? I know I'm not re using the old sand but the new sand do I need to use live ? Or could I do dry sand. Would the new tank want to cycle ? Thx again for the advice

143MPCo · Dec 5, 2014

Tjohnson8057 said:
Would I want to have set up where I just use my water and have some made to fill in the rest?

I would use as much of the old tank water as possible, you still need enough to transport, fish and coral, and use makeup water for the rest.

Tjohnson8057 said:
I know I'm not re using the old sand but the new sand do I need to use live ? Or could I do dry sand. Would the new tank want to cycle ? Thx again for the advice

I would use some of the old sand to help you seed and cycle, odds are the old sand if full of stuff you really don't want.

just and FYI... from everything I have read most so called "live sand" has some sort of additive to keep whatever bacteria they have added in hibernation, a lot of times it's high level a PO4 and other crap.

Tjohnson8057 · Dec 5, 2014

Yea I was thinking use all the old water I can. Thx for the info!

fishroomlady · Dec 5, 2014

You may be able to accomplish it with the advice given without a major cycle - I might suggest adding some bacteria - I like microbacter 7 to assist with the transition and settling out of things and to hopefully help prevent a major cycle.

Tjohnson8057 · Dec 5, 2014

Is that made by brightwell? That's what I used when I started my tank

Tjohnson8057 · Dec 5, 2014

I'm also wondering if I was to go way bigger would that be a an issue even though I'm gonna use as much of my old water I can. if I was to Goto a 150 + that would be a lot of new water.

fishroomlady · Dec 5, 2014

it would depend on what you'll have in terms of biological filter - are you planning on getting a lot more rock? water itself can help a little bit but it doesn't contain the bulk of the biological filter that you need - that would be from the rock. If you get a good amount of cycled rock to add, you may be able to minimize a cycle but it would depend a lot on the quality of rock and such....

Tjohnson8057 · Dec 5, 2014

My LFS's got a lot of cycled live rock. I would def be adding more to get the aquascape that I like. Even when I first set up my tank my cycle the ammonia spike was super min.