Transferring to a bigger system help

[unclephatpat42]

Well it's about time to transfer to the bigger system. I want to use the same sand and of course same rocks. How should I go about this? Do I have to do anything with the sand like rinse it off before going in? I don't want to lose any of the little worms I have in the sand bed.

 

[Adam Baggett]

Well rinsing your sand is a two edged sward. If you rinse it then you can potentially get rid of waste from it and start with nice clean sand, on the other hand you could kill/wash out the beneficial life in it. Also the other thing to consider with the sand is how old is it? If it has been in your old system for many years then you could be better starting with new sand that is not holding on to Nitrates and Phosphates.

Me, if the sand is not too old (10+ years) I would not rinse it to preserve the life in it, same with the rock.

 

[tigerdragon]

There is an inherent prob with transferring existing sand. It can and will unleash bad toxins once you disturb it. Esp if it was a dsb. Personally i would do a new sand bed esp if you plan on going from one tank to next in one shot you are going to get a mini cycle this is unavoidable but your rock is what holds most of your bacteria. In a few months i am going to move from a 90 to a 200 but i plan on cycling my 200 first i will be using new sand and my existing rock but will also have new rock as my 90 only has around 50# of rock but all is big chunks. There are many who have done tank transfers without much issue but from what i remember all went with new sand.

 

[unclephatpat42]

Well I did go deep sand bed, but I've got only been up since nov.

I'm thinking should I go in this order

Rocks transfer first
Remove fish and coral
Drain the tank without disturbing the sand bed
Then remove the sand and transfer it

 

[Stephanie11]

Honestly get new sand or plan to be bare bottom for a while. Wash and prep used sand over the long haul. There are a lot of nasties in sand even after a month. I moved from a 90 to a 125 after a year. I had a deep sand bed and when I took that sand bed out there was a lot of detritus and black junk. I went bare bottom for a month. Added a shallow sand bed. Everything survived. After a month I moved some rock and was surprised on how much detritus there was. I have a great cleanup crew, I do water changes weekly, I have a beast skimmer, fuge... When I moved some rock after a month I had a minor ammonia spike and a mini cycle. Lost just a few sps, probably 5% of all life I had. When moving tanks I find it easier just to replace the sand bed.

 

[Jc_ellis]

If its only been up since November, when you drain the tank siphon the sand bed to get out the little bit of detritus trapped in it. It'll possibly eliminate a mini cycle when you transfer and disturbing the sand bed is a moot point since you have to scoop it all out and move it. Any anaerobic layers developed over the last couple months will be destroyed as soon as you scoop it out.