Tank transfer logistics

[brandon429]

it is ok to try a custom run on anything you like, the fact remains if you're patterning something that comes from a work thread the outcome is fairly well known. Jedi is very experienced in not fearing bacterial loss he he. he and I can't be sold bottle bac when it's not needed, we're immune.

when you move rocks, the only source of bacteria that needs to transfer, you can wash them off in saltwater and scrape away any bad hitchers. this preserves your filter base

the reason you tap rinse prepare all sand, even the kind in the bag that says don't rinse, is because you want a cloudless perfect first fill you don't want fifteen days of silt and white flaking on the inside walls, you want to follow directions to get what the fifty pager gives. transfer rocks into any system you want and it will all skip cycle, rinse your sandbed whether it's new or old 100% clean and use not one single handful from the old tank if you want perfect safety.

there are no tank transfer threads on the web for partially-rinsed setups. the only real tank transfer thread on the web is full on blast rinsed beds, zero detritus moves and total safety skip cycles. and no bottle bac used, it's all real skip cycle no fear work documented.

 

[Jedi1199]

it is ok to try a custom run on anything you like, the fact remains if you're patterning something that comes from a work thread the outcome is fairly well known. Jedi is very experienced in not fearing bacterial loss he he. he and I can't be sold bottle bac when it's not needed, we're immune.

when you move rocks, the only source of bacteria that needs to transfer, you can wash them off in saltwater and scrape away any bad hitchers. this preserves your filter base

the reason you tap rinse prepare all sand, even the kind in the bag that says don't rinse, is because you want a cloudless perfect first fill you don't want fifteen days of silt and white flaking on the inside walls, you want to follow directions to get what the fifty pager gives. transfer rocks into any system you want and it will all skip cycle, rinse your sandbed whether it's new or old 100% clean and use not one single handful from the old tank if you want perfect safety.

there are no tank transfer threads on the web for partially-rinsed setups. the only real tank transfer thread on the web is full on blast rinsed beds, zero detritus moves and total safety skip cycles. and no bottle bac used, it's all real skip cycle no fear work documented.

Brandon, there are a couple reasons I went the way I did with my 135 build. If you read the thread, you will see.

In the end, the first fill was super cloudy. I did have the advantage of the super powerful canister filter to cut that down to hours instead of days. It took 3 days to introduce the stock back to the tank because of temperature. nothing else. If I could have had the temp correct on day 1, the stock would have been placed as soon as the water cleared out.

I personally did not want to wash the sand because I wanted to keep as much of the microfauna as I could. Copapods, asterina stars ect ect all play a part in the system as a whole and I did not wish to eradicate that.

As for not using bottled bacteria, why would I? The rocks were well established as were the canister filters. I increased water volume and footprint, not bioload. In that instance, it is clear, that what worked in 55 would work just as well in 135.

 

[Gregg @ ADP]

The issue here is that no matter how well you swish it around, you are still transferring enough to overwhelm a not established biofilter. Too many tank crashes proving the issue to think this is still a good idea. A good friend of mine locally recently lost his Home Display, plus his side business that was week established, because of this.

To me, it's not worth it.

Transferring enough what? Stuff that was already in your tank? That should never cause a crash.

And not sure what the ‘not an established biofilter’ means. Why would it not be established. Moving sand and live rock from one system to another should at most have a negligible impact on nitrification for about 6 hours.

Not sure what else people are doing during tank moves that is causing them to crash. It should never happen.

 

[Lost in the Sauce]

I’ve done it countless times.

Transferring enough what? Stuff that was already in your tank? That should never cause a crash.

And not sure what the ‘not an established biofilter’ means. Why would it not be established. Moving sand and live rock from one system to another should at most have a negligible impact on nitrification for about 6 hours.

Not sure what else people are doing during tank moves that is causing them to crash. It should never happen.

Enough decaying organic matter that it overloads your biofilter and creates more ammonia than your system can process, causing the levels to rise, and alive things become not alive.

Moving over sand (and the accompanying gunk) that has not been washed, is causing them to crash.

 

[EeyoreIsMySpiritAnimal]

Stuff that was already in your tank? That should never cause a crash.

It can when the "stuff" used to be buried in the sandbed...

 

[Jedi1199]

I am with @Gregg @ ADP on this one guys..

My tank transfer was seamless with unwashed sand. There are variables which I did mention above, but still...


The way you guys talk, it is almost as if once the sand goes in "You must never disturb it or you will suffer the catastrophe"

I know this is not what you are saying but, that is how it comes across. If I was to vacuum out my sand bed, based on the advice given here, I would likely trigger a huge spike in undesirable elements that would wipe out my system. Hogwash!!

What if I were to simply stir it up.. attempting to release the trapped particles to be taken up by the filtration system? Would I expect a tank crash at that point? Ive been doing that for over 35 years in both fresh and salt tanks.. never had a crash yet. So just exactly WHERE are you basing this information from?

 

[BaliReefBox]

I did a tank upgrade 3 weeks ago to a larger tank. My old tank was only 3 months old and I used all the old sand and a new bag of caribsea special grade with no rinsing. My water was cloudy for 2 hours only. I will preface that I only had a very light bio load in the old tank. I used as much water from the old tank I could get out from syphoning. Checked my levels for the next week daily and all was rock solid. There are so many differing views on tank transfers and I spent a heap of time reading them. This worked for me and I took the reference from this forum that if the sand was less then say 6 months old a staight transfer would be ok...it was for me but as we know all tanks are differnt

 

[EeyoreIsMySpiritAnimal]

My old tank was only 3 months old

This is the reason you didn't have a problem...

 

[Jedi1199]

Ok guys.. let me clarify here.. First, as I mentioned, this was a significant upgrade. Triple the volume and more than double the footprint. Second, I had an oversized canister filter on my old tank that I ran for several days after the transfer.

Further I followed protocols that I have learned over several decades of aquarium keeping.

I believe that last statement is key here. If I were to dump one tank into another, IE transfer everything immediately, it would make sense that the undesirable elements would possibly be enough during the first few hours to crash a system.

That said, I stand by my reasoning that if I were to stir up my sand, it would NOT crash my tank. I have done it enough times to know.

 

[Gatorpa]

I disagree on all new sand.

When I do something like this, I drain 95% of the water, stir the sand up to fluff out detritus, mix it around for a few minutes, then pile all of the sand up in one corner. Remove the remaining water.

Scoop the sand out, add to new tank, add some additional new sand, and you instantly have a nice, established sand bed.

That’s how I have always done it.
Moved tanks like 7 times and never had a crash.

 

[Gatorpa]

I wonder if the problem people have with nutrients bottoming out after a tank transfer has more to do with the increase in water volume at an equivalent feeding schedule and the large water change involved in doing the transfer than it does with using new sand.

Then again, I can't really see how reusing sand is bad as well? I'm not really sure what people are worried about here? Do they think the sand will release extra ammonia? Why would it do that and where exactly was the ammonia tied up in the first place? I didn't think sand could absorb ammonia. I wonder if people who excessively rinsed the old sand ended up killing off most of the microfauna in the sand and this mass die-off triggered a mini-cycle. In this case, I think messing with the old sand as little as possible would be the best route if using the old sand (just like what Jedi1199 and Gregg @ ADP did).

One legit issue is the release of H2SO4, that you can smell when removing the old sand. Rotten egg smell

 

[EeyoreIsMySpiritAnimal]

One legit issue is the release of H2SO4, that you can smell when removing the old sand. Rotten egg smell

And I don't trust my nose to be sensitive enough to notice if there's still any left after rinsing, especially after messing with everything for a few hours...
IME, better safe than sorry unless you're moving a young sandbed or have consistently stirred a shallow bed...

 

[Gatorpa]

I am with @Gregg @ ADP on this one guys..

My tank transfer was seamless with unwashed sand. There are variables which I did mention above, but still...


The way you guys talk, it is almost as if once the sand goes in "You must never disturb it or you will suffer the catastrophe"

I know this is not what you are saying but, that is how it comes across. If I was to vacuum out my sand bed, based on the advice given here, I would likely trigger a huge spike in undesirable elements that would wipe out my system. Hogwash!!

What if I were to simply stir it up.. attempting to release the trapped particles to be taken up by the filtration system? Would I expect a tank crash at that point? Ive been doing that for over 35 years in both fresh and salt tanks.. never had a crash yet. So just exactly WHERE are you basing this information from?

Perhaps their experience is based on deep sand beds with areas of hypoxia or H2SO4….?

 

[Gatorpa]

And I don't trust my nose to be sensitive enough to notice if there's still any left after rinsing, especially after messing with everything for a few hours...
IME, better safe than sorry unless you're moving a young sandbed or have consistently stirred a shallow bed...

If you have ever smelt it you will know it.
Ive helped a few guys break down tanks and it will clear the house.

 

[EeyoreIsMySpiritAnimal]

If you have ever smelt it you will know it.
Ive helped a few guys break down tanks and it will clear the house.

Yes, and smaller pockets won't. Or, some people do smell it somewhat but rinse anyway and don't remove it all.

In any case, I'm sure the OP gets the idea.

 

[Jedi1199]

One legit issue is the release of H2SO4, that you can smell when removing the old sand. Rotten egg smell

And this means what?

When I did my original build for the 55, I used a bucket of unwashed sand from the guy I got my 180g from. it had that strong "rotten egg" smell.

That tank ran beautifully for as long as I had it set up. In fact, aside from an outbreak of Bryopsis, it ran perfectly from day 1 to day 450ish when I upgraded.

Further, the sand I reused, after sitting for a day in a bucket, had the same scent of rotten egg, although not as bad as the sand I used in the start. Again, the transfer was seamless.

 

[Gregg @ ADP]

Enough decaying organic matter that it overloads your biofilter and creates more ammonia than your system can process, causing the levels to rise, and alive things become not alive.

Moving over sand (and the accompanying gunk) that has not been washed, is causing them to crash.

That should never happen

 

[BaliReefBox]

This is the reason you didn't have a problem...

Yes I agree and because of the research I did it was suggested that anything less than 6months old "should" be oki... tha and the light load is why I reused eveything

 

[saltcats]

And this means what?

When I did my original build for the 55, I used a bucket of unwashed sand from the guy I got my 180g from. it had that strong "rotten egg" smell.

That tank ran beautifully for as long as I had it set up. In fact, aside from an outbreak of Bryopsis, it ran perfectly from day 1 to day 450ish when I upgraded.

Further, the sand I reused, after sitting for a day in a bucket, had the same scent of rotten egg, although not as bad as the sand I used in the start. Again, the transfer was seamless.

I think the fact that livestock wasn't added to the tank the same day might make a difference here though - the hydrogen sulfide (H2S, not H2SO4 - that's sulfuric acid ) will off-gas and not be a problem anymore. Small amounts of it also probably aren't a significant problem, so depending on how hypoxic areas of the sandbed had gotten doing a full transfer in one day also might have no issue. But then, if a sandbed had significant amounts of hypoxic areas, released a lot of sulfide into the water, had a lot of fish demanding oxygen eg, could cause a crash in that setup.
But any issue from reusing sand would only be relevant the immediate few days after, as I understand it - after the initial disturbance and release nothing more should come out down the line.

 

[Jedi1199]

I think the fact that livestock wasn't added to the tank the same day might make a difference here though - the hydrogen sulfide (H2S, not H2SO4 - that's sulfuric acid ) will off-gas and not be a problem anymore. Small amounts of it also probably aren't a significant problem, so depending on how hypoxic areas of the sandbed had gotten doing a full transfer in one day also might have no issue. But then, if a sandbed had significant amounts of hypoxic areas, released a lot of sulfide into the water, had a lot of fish demanding oxygen eg, could cause a crash in that setup.
But any issue from reusing sand would only be relevant the immediate few days after, as I understand it - after the initial disturbance and release nothing more should come out down the line.

So if i am reading you correctly, even with the strong rotten egg smell, given a day or so, transfer will be fine. Seems to me exactly what I did. hmmmm