Draining Tank

[brians_224]

Thanks for your time.

I am going to reaquascape my 45 gallon this morning. Last night I read a web site that recommended draining the tank and arranging your rock in an empty tank - then refilling.

Do you recommend this method?

I have 15 gallons of salt water made up - I'm going to do a water change, and use the water to house my lr, and corals and such while i rearrange.

I'm afraid I'll cause an ammonia spike? I read in anthony's old forum - he recommended draing a tank to remove fish. I don't know how much time is acceptable for the live rock to be out of h2o.

 

[Andrew]

Don't remove all the water but I would remove some to put the fish in buckets and ect. Some people just move their rocks around with the fish in the tank and just put the corals on the sandbed. Thats what I do. You just have to make sure you dont stur the tank up too much or smash the fish.

 

[chip721]

Use your best judgment. Your lr can be out of water for a short period of time with no real ill effects. But IMO, I'd keep it submerged as much as possible. Drain enough of your tank water (~ 15g) to house your lr in another container while you work out re-arranging things in the tank.

 

[mcox33]

The last time we redid my 90 it took us 36 hours to get everything back in the tank. I coral all over the house in every plastic container I could find. the rock was just set out on plastic single layer so I could see them to pick and choose the ones I wanted when.

Took out most of the water and replaced with new water.

I would drain the whole thing move all the sand to the front glass put the rock back in use some of the dirty water say 25 to 30 % and then refill with new water. You just did a 70% water change and I have been know to do 80% without problems.

Just don't let your rock dry out.

Just so you know, I maintain our club tank. It had a agrocrete rock in it that kept the ph screwed up so when I took over the maintainance of the tank I took it out.

Well I wasn't putting it in any tank I had so it just sat for several days, in a black plastic trash bag, before I even took it out of the back of the truck, . (summer time) when I did I noticed that there were still pods and things on the rock, so you should have plenty of time to arrange your rock without problems.