Moving soon need tips

[Ovuel]

So due to unexpected family situations I am going to be moving to the Gainesville Area in about 2 weeks. Had I known this before I acquired three clownfish over the last two weeks I obviously would not had done so. Whatever the situation is, I have these three fish and I really don't want to give up any of them.

Here is my plan for the move, please let me know if I can do anything differently.

Day before move:

- Do not feed fish
- Drain 3.5Gal from each tank and place it in a bucket with all the LR.

Day of move:

- Do not feed fish
- Net fish and place them in a platic bag 1/2 water half air from an air pump.
- Place bags in styrafoam container for moving.
- Drain 3.5Gal from each tank into a bucket with all the LS.
- Drain tank, clean all parts, load car and drive.
- Arrive, unpack tanks, add LS and water followed by LR and water.
- Mix 10Gal of water and add to each tank.
- Setup all equipment on both tanks.
- Aclimate fish and release.

Questions:

1. I am going to put water in a bucket with LR and LS, can this bucket be sealed for the 5 hour drive or does it need to be vented?

2. Is there anything I can be doing to prepare my fish for this newest shock they will be put through?

3. Would I be better to keep the LS in the tanks, covered with water during the trip as opposed to moving things to buckets and back out?

Thanks in advance everybody,

-Rob

 

[GSMguy]

good plan
the buckets can be sealed up definetly

depending on how old your sand is you might want to go with new LS

i moved my entire tank 9 hours plus a short boat ride last summer
set it up three months took it apart and moved it back 9 hours everything survived

 

[Zestay]

hey im in gainesville . send me a PM if you need a hand setting up. BTW weve got 2 fully stocked salt water stores in town .. both are good stores.
tuesday is shipment day for both of them =)

 

[Zestay]

also make sure the heaters are up and running and the water temp is where you want it. besure to float all the bags to match tempature ( or use a drip line set up for acclimation) personaly id only feed a little bit the day they get into thier new ( well new again ) home. id also change teh aquascaping a little so new terriotories can be devolped.

just my 2 cents.

 

[Ovuel]

Thanks for the pointers, I do appreciate it.

GSM,

My LS was LS when I bought it about a month and a half ago, and as I mentioned before I didn't have to go through a complete cycle as I was able to skim LR from our display tanks at work. I did have permission to do this so it's not like I did it behind anybodies back. I was contemplating adding a second 20lb bag of LS anyways, just to give myself a bit deeper of a sand bed since I have a 20L tank. I could possibly split the middle and "overpay" for a 10 lb bag and probably get things to work out I would assume?

Zestay,

I definately thought about you being in Gator country when I was positive I was going to be making the move. At this time I don't think I will need much help getting things set up as they are only 2 "small" 20 gallons, but I do very much appreciate the offer.

I like the idea of changing the aquascaping for territorial concerns, however at this time the only non-invert inhabitants of my tank are the two Percs and a Green Chrommy which will move to the wive's tank after we move. My scooter blenny didn't make it due to equipment failure. Nothing like coming home and finding your tank at 92F. The ironic part was it was my backup heater that failed on. I was able to Icecube the tank back to 88F over the course of about 30 minutes, then I let natural ventillation take care of getting it back down to 81F. All in all I only lost the Scooter and 1 Turbo so I guess I can't complain too much. I guess that is what I get for buying a heater that was on clearance.

I am working with work to attempt to transfer to the Petco up there in Gainesville, I would assume they carry a mild saltwater selection there as well. Once I get to the area (I have lived around there before), maybe we can get together on a common day off and we can run all over town fish store hopping? Tuesday is shippment day at our Petco down here as well. Something to keep in mind, even though we are a chain store we can order specific items once they become available. The problem we have is we don't always have the greatest availability. I do have to admit though, that it feels like cheating when you get to go to "work", help select which fish will be ordered that week, then handpick what you want out of the order. Even as a non-employee the same service is extended to customers. If we had a customer looking for a lets say Powder Brown Tang, we would take their name and number then once it became available on our inventory we would call that person, ask if they were still interested and if they were order that item. The other semi-nice thing is that no down payment is required (at least not my current store) for special orders. Once we get something in though we contact the customer to let them know arrival time and everything else, and if for some reason they change their mind or we go days without contacting them we will have to make that item available to any customer.

On a different note after striking out with Aquatraders.com, to the point that I reported them to the BBB, I received my new light today from a distributer (Webaquatics) out of the Miami area. $125 with shipping for a 130W dual strip (65W each) PC, an orbit I believe, and got it setup over my tank. I can't wait to see the moonlight on it when I go to bed tonight. It looks incredible and I am thinking that since I have a 20L I would have sufficient lighting to try my hand at a BTA in 4-6 months. I will probably start off with something a little easier at first..ie Xenia or something like that, but it is IMO kind of a disservice to my fish to set up a tank specifically for them, and not do my best to replicate their natural habitat.