Questions on upgrading to a larger reef

[Tangina20]

I am currently in the process of upgrading a 40 breeder that has been up for a year to a 100 gallon reef. My 40 is a mixed reef including acroporas. I see a lot of things online that you need a "mature" reef in order to be successful with acros. When my 100 finished cycling do I need to wait a while to be able to put my acros and other sps in the new tank?

 

[nezw0001]

Moving can be hard on acros, even if you keep all your water and rock. Are you starting this new tank with new rock and water or transferring from your existing system? Either way my advise would be to frag everything so you have back ups. If you are starting with new rock and water your going to have to let that ecosystem mature. If you are using your existing rock and water you can speed up the process but will still likely lose some SPS.

When i upgraded my 220 to my 450 i lost and stressed most of my big SPS colonies. The frags took the move better. Good luck.

 

[Tangina20]

Moving can be hard on acros, even if you keep all your water and rock. Are you starting this new tank with new rock and water or transferring from your existing system? Either way my advise would be to frag everything so you have back ups. If you are starting with new rock and water your going to have to let that ecosystem mature. If you are using your existing rock and water you can speed up the process but will still likely lose some SPS.

When i upgraded my 220 to my 450 i lost and stressed most of my big SPS colonies. The frags took the move better. Good luck.

I will be starting it all from new rock. I guess I could keep the old talk up and running and slowly do the transfer over time. How long did you wait to move over your corals to the 450?

 

[nezw0001]

I will be starting it all from new rock. I guess I could keep the old talk up and running and slowly do the transfer over time. How long did you wait to move over your corals to the 450?

I had the 450 set up for 6 weeks before moving everything

 

[SDK]

I will be starting it all from new rock. I guess I could keep the old talk up and running and slowly do the transfer over time. How long did you wait to move over your corals to the 450?

This is always going to be your best bet if you have the room and resources. I'm doing this now on a smaller scale (Nuvo 20 to 40BR). I plan on having the tanks run concurrently for 4 to 6 months if needed.

Once you have everything stabilized in the big tank, frag up everything left in the 40 and have yourself a sale...

 

[ca1ore]

Curious why you wouldn’t use the established rock from your 40? Using all new rock will mean that the new tank will have to recycle, at least in part, which would be problematic for the corals. When I’ve done upgrades, I initially add some new dry rock, but move everything over, including as much of the old water as possible. I then add additional rock slowly over a few months. I have lost the occasional SPS colony, but not most.

 

[Kzang]

Curious why you wouldn’t use the established rock from your 40? Using all new rock will mean that the new tank will have to recycle, at least in part, which would be problematic for the corals. When I’ve done upgrades, I initially add some new dry rock, but move everything over, including as much of the old water as possible. I then add additional rock slowly over a few months. I have lost the occasional SPS colony, but not most.

Moving old water is just adding polluted water. There is zero reason to add old water in my opinion

 

[nezw0001]

Moving water, at least some, is also moving some of the bacteriologic biome of the old tank and helping populate a barren tank with a maximum amount of good biology.

 

[ca1ore]

Moving old water is just adding polluted water. There is zero reason to add old water in my opinion

If your existing water is polluted, I’d suggest improving your skills as a reefer LOL. Most experienced reefers will tell you that consistency and stability are more important than absolute levels (within reason). When moving tanks, minimizing parameter shifts equates to reduced losses .... particularly with SPS. Though controversial, this may even mean reusing the old sand. Either way, reusing as much of the existing tank water as possible helps to mitigate parameter shifts. As it is, moving from a 40 to a 100 is more than a 50% water change. 100% water changes aren’t wise ... even under ideal circumstances.

 

[45ZoaGarden]

If your current water is polluted you’re not giving your acro’s a very good environment. It’s better to bring the established rock and water to a new tank then to ditch the established colonies of bacteria and start over. Pointless imo. If you’re starting fresh you’re going to need Atleast a year to bring acro’s over.

 

[Tangina20]

Curious why you wouldn’t use the established rock from your 40? Using all new rock will mean that the new tank will have to recycle, at least in part, which would be problematic for the corals. When I’ve done upgrades, I initially add some new dry rock, but move everything over, including as much of the old water as possible. I then add additional rock slowly over a few months. I have lost the occasional SPS colony, but not most.

I wanted to avoid a few types of algae that are in the current tank and I also wanted all of the rock to match ( new tank has Marco shelf and reef saver)

 

[lavoisier]

The advice on "mature" tanks has to do with stability. The issue with any new tank set up, even using previous rock, is the stability of the water. That usually takes time in our complex systems.

 

[User1]

I'll throw down in the thread after going through a similar process 19 or so months ago. Similar to you I went from a 40 breeder to a 210 gallon tank. It was an upgrade so the 40's existing rock, some sand/substrate, fish, corals, basically everything, was moving once the 210 finished the cycle. So complete.


I used 150 LBS of dry rock, Pukani, in the fishless cycle. Started in Feb, finished cycle in March, left tank along with skimmer, lights, and return pumps for another 40 days before I moved the 40 into the 210. If I was to do it over again I would use TBS rock or cycle the dry rock in stock tanks because the rock takes a lot of time, and I mean a lot of time, to fully mature. Doesn't matter if you move rock over depending on the amount of dry it just needs time.

All in all I lost 4 large colonies of hammers, 2 rose bubble tip anemones (out of 11), 1 large Kenya tree (had others so not a huge deal) and my Xenia died off (has since come back). My experience when doing this is that the Pukani just need more time for the biological stuff to take hold.

I did not move any SPS over. Only LPS and Soft corals. I added SPS and clams at the 16 month marker though and they are doing well.