Moving and need advice

[wnehez]

I will be moving in about a month or two and I want to know what the best way to move my tank would be. Should I leave enough water in the tank when I move it for the fish to stay in there? Should I take the fish out and put in container/bags? Should I use new water or keep the water thats in it? I really am not looking forward to moving it because my buddy told me how much of a pain it was moving his and I want to make it as least stressful on the fish as possible. I was going to jus get rid of the water and buy a bunch of the 5 gallon jugs to refill it since that water is purified and what not. The house im moving to has well water so I dont wanna take the chance of there being harmful stuff in the water. Just looking for suggestions on the best way to move it.

 

[newby30gallon]

looking forward to an answer on this as well, im moving in 5 months and will be moving a 30 gal fowlr. i would imagine keeping the water as it has already cycled. otherwise it would almost be like starting over.

how big is the setup?

 

[Aquaman]

empty the tank, purchase a cooler and move the fish into the cooler, wallmart carries a battery operated bait airator, get that to give the fish oxygenated water. Skip trying to keep any water from the old tank, it will be nasty by the time you get where your going. As for the water for the fish, you could put a small amount of old tank water in the cooler, but aclimate them to the new saltwater.

I transported 20 fish from Dallas to Orlando, 3 days straight drive, I put the fish in a cooler, duct taped shut with the bait airator poked through the top, and didn't lose a single fish. the cooler sat on top of the tank, stand and rock in the back of a truck in 80+ degree weather the whole way, when I got to orlando I checked the temp and it was 78deg.

Depending on the well at the new house a standard RO/DI unit will be fine, I'm on a well and dont have any issues. I do have a water softener on the system so the water that hits my RO is already cleaned of some stuff.

Keep the rock wet, the sand if any should be rinsed and cleaned. Yes your going to start over with a cycle, but depending on how far you have to go before restarting the tank the cycle will be short, you will have to keep your fish in a holding tank till the tank cycles.

you dont want to move the tank any distance with water in it, it tends to stress the seams. You could move the old tank water in buckets but remember the longer it sits stagnent the worse it gets.

 

[wnehez]

good idea about the cooler... I dont have to go far... its prolly about 5 mins away so I think using the same water will be fine. Maybe even just use like 75% of the old water just to bring some new water in... Does that sound like it will work? Also, I was just going to buy a couple 5 gallon jugs of water(like the ones that go upside down in a dispenser) so I didnt have to use the well water before I find out if the water is ok. Should I just stick with the old water and maybe replace 25% of it with the fresh new water?

 

[matthewl04]

Yeah I would do a 25% water change and make sure you have extra on hand just in case you have any spikes in your levels. I upgraded my tank and reused the old sand even though most don't recommend it and I have had no problems at all and that was a month ago.

 

[RVANANO]

I would also re-use 75% of the old water as to not shock the fish anymore than the move.

 

[asonitez]

My Move:

Fish Are shipped in the equivalent of a cup of water In a bag with Pure Oxygen (If I'm not mistaken) All the way from the other side of the world where they spend days in the Air/Varying Temperatures etc. Moving 5 minutes away is not hard and can be planned easilly. I moved 1 hour away and heres what I did.

4 Days before the move.

Day 1: Purchase/Borrowed 1 Brute Container from Home Depot Reinforced with Locking Cover - 14.99
-Removed the most of My Rock Taking care to Pack them securely in the Brute Container.
- Removed 1 Powerhead From the Tank and Placed it in the brute container with rock.
- Picked up a Nylon Air valve splitter with 4 out 1 in and a few Foam Air-Bars and lots of 1/4 Tubing. Put them in the Brute to make sure rocks were aerated and water was moving around. I used 30% Tank Water and 70% newly mixed water to fill up brute container covering rocks.
*Note - The water level In your tank will drop significantly. What I did was pump water from my sump back into the tank and too this time to take down my filtration system and clean everything up. Your tank will be fine without filtration for the next few days. Your setup time will be greatly reduced if everything is packed neatly and cleaned before hand.

Day 2: Stopped Feeding Fish. All sediment in the tank from moving rocks was now settled on top of the live sand. If you plan to KEEP your live sand at this point you can Siphon the sediment off of the top of the sand into a bucket wait for it to settle pour water back into the tank and thus doing remove minimal water and mostly waste/sediment. Pick up a few bags from your Local Fish Shop. Offer to pay them a few bucks and let them know your Moving the contents of your tank. Offer to buy a box of bags at their costs if necessary. The alternative is pickup a bunch of zip-lock bags OR hit up a Dollar store and purchase lots of Fake Plastic Containers. (I did a combination of all 3).

Day 3: (Night Before Move) Bag your Corals which should be a bunch of frag plugs/Colonies on your sand/racks at this point. On day 1 if you wanted to you could zip lock some egg crate and make a few sinking coral racks in your tank.

- Bag your corals and Float them in your tank that night.

Day 4 : AM morning of the move - Hopefully you dedicated this day to moving your tank and thats all you need to do.

Bag your fish as they sleep. If you stopped feeding them then they will spew little waste into the bags keeping the water quality in the bag decent. USE LARGE bags - 1/3 With Water 2/3 with AIR. Double Bag.

The most complicated part of your tank (sump & electronics) were already taken down 3 days ago. Scoop out your live sand into a rubbermaid or garbage bag and load up the tank and equip. Move the tank outside and spray it down if you got a hose to remove remaining sediment. Move tank and equip. If its hot outside 90 Deg+ move corals in a cooler with 2/3 bag of ice lining the bottom. Same for Fish. If its < 80 outside then the water temp in the bags is hovering around 70 which is fine for moving the fish.


Move to new place and setup your tank. Use Water from the Rock Brute container to RINSE the rock off and place in new tank. And same for rinsing the sand. Setup your tank. I used 50% old water and 50% new water. (If you can Have your water mixed and ready at the new place.)

If you have them pour out fish into acclimating buckets etc and run a airstone to each bucket. They should be moving about but confused maybe stressed. Take their acclimation time to finish setting up your tank /sump/plumbing. Worse case scenario run your water level in the new tank LOWER than normal and get your stuff in there before you bring the sump online. Acclimate fish and corals move into main tank turn on pumps... fix leak...drink beer....bang understanding wife. Spend next few weeks Fixing your aquascape.

 

[Aquaman]

I'd still plan on setting up the new tank with at least %40 new saltwater, great time to do a large water change. Does the tank have sand? if so you will want to have extra saltwater to do water changes a day or so after you reset the tank back up, disturbing sand beds from a move can release lots of crap into the water collumn, granted you should already have saved out "good" tank water for your new tank, but lots of crap will still be released into the new setup by the sand.

I've moved over two dozen large (125) or bigger tanks over the past 10 years, and have always found that using less of the origonal tank water is better.

 

[MrBillLumberg]

i dont know if anyone addressed it but what size is the tank? If its a nano or something up to maybe 40g, I think you could just leave all sand and a few inches of water in the tank and just move the rest in seperate containers.

I will be moving in the next couple of months so I have thought about this. I have a 40 breeder setup and I will only remove the rock, fish and coral. And most of the water. This way there shouldnt be any measureable cycle and the sand bed will not be disturbed too badly.

Chris

 

[dogstar74]

I wouldn't re-use the sand if there is extensive disruption of the sand bed. Anoxic areas of Hydrogen sulfide gas can be toxic to fishes. If you do re-use the sand, I'd wash it out with a hose to the point that it's almost new sand again anyway.

Good luck with the move. 5 min is nothing you'll be fine.

Aaron

 

[ginger7286]

Yes, the size of your tank? From experience I will suggest a professional to move your tank unless it's a 30 or less. I have moved twice since I have had my tanks (never again, they'll drag my dead carcass out of this place). I moved the 30 gallon myself and I let the pros at a LFS that I trust move my 125. Even the 30 was a PITA!!!. Water gets everywhere even with lids, the fish and other inverts get stressed, tanks, stands, rock equipment and water weigh more than you think. All of the above listed items take up room, are messy and bulky. Besides if when they put it back together and any of the equipmet leaks they fix it before they leave. They won't guarantee the glass in the tank from leaking but really as long as they know what they are doing that shouldn't be a problem. Just a little humble experience advice for you. Either way good luck.

 

[Dream2aReef]

Sorry if I repeat something someone else has already said but, I thought I'd give you run down of how we did it. We didn't move far and I saw in an earlier post where you said you are moving far either.

We picked up a bunch of 5gl buckets w/ lids, rubbermaid totes, and plastic fish bags. We took all of water with us and the fish went in the 5gl buckets, the live rock that didn't have corals attached went in other 5gl buckets and totes, and corals were bagged. The pieces of LR that had corals attached were placed on top of bare LR in 5gl buckets and totes. The tanks were moved with all the sand still insaide and about an inch or two of water. Once we arrived at our new house we just reversed the process putting everything back in the tanks.

 

[wnehez]

I have a 75g FOWLR tank. What I was planning on doing was getting the 5g buckets with lids, putting the water in them, about 75% of it, and I was not sure what to do with the fish. I was going to leave the sand in there with some water. Since its not far, I figured that would be alright. Should I place the fish in the buckets with water? and I will just put the LR in some of the buckets with water. Not with the fish tho. Can I leave my CUC in there or should they be bagged seperatley? Again, its not far.

 

[acropora1981]

This is a simple move, though it will be time consuming.

Get some water containers (camping gear area) from walmart or use old salt buckets.

Disconnect pumps etc so that everything can be moved quickly once the power is off

Remove liverock and place into either buckets full of water OR in empty buckets and cover with wet newspaper (this is how LR is shipped and how i move it for short trips)

Gravel wash your gravel or sand. removes organics that could otherwise breakdown or give you problems during the move

Remove most of the water to the buckets, bag or bucket the fish, load up the van/truck, drive to new location, put tank and stand in place and get water, rock and fish back in tank ASAP, get heater and a powerhead running ASAP as well.

Replumb. End.

You should be able to accomplish this in <3.5 hrs. I don't recommend having much/any water in the bottom of the tank. Water is HEAVY and could structurally compromise your tank. The sand should be fine as long as it is wet and not terribly loaded with organics (hence my recommendation to gravel wash it prior to the move).

Ive done it that way about 10X for customers who want to move a salt tank.

PS, definately don't do it alone unless you have a dolly!