tank is over six months, but switching containers?

[OrangeKoi]

My tank is a thirty gallon cube. It has been up running since early February. Due to technical difficulties I need to switch the tank. I will be keeping the rocks, sand etc filtered and as stable as I can While switching tanks.

I thought I would put the sand into open ziplocks and lie them flat so water flow is not cut off completely. That will allow me to get the sand back into the tank first without too much trouble. Then I will transfer the water (replacing five gallons at some point in this process to hopefully keep stress levels down) and rocks and critters.

Hopefully this process will go smoothly. The new tank will not have anything on the glass.

At what point would it be reasonable to get a BTA? Would I need to wait again?

 

[kkyyllee]

id say wait a month, that will give evrything time to get settled back in again

 

[E.J. Coral]

Re: tank is over six months, but switching containers?

How much sand? Is it live? What were the technical difficulties in the previous tank?

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=10547033#post10547033 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by OrangeKoi
My tank is a thirty gallon cube. It has been up running since early February. Due to technical difficulties I need to switch the tank. I will be keeping the rocks, sand etc filtered and as stable as I can While switching tanks.

I thought I would put the sand into open ziplocks and lie them flat so water flow is not cut off completely. That will allow me to get the sand back into the tank first without too much trouble. Then I will transfer the water (replacing five gallons at some point in this process to hopefully keep stress levels down) and rocks and critters.

Hopefully this process will go smoothly. The new tank will not have anything on the glass.

At what point would it be reasonable to get a BTA? Would I need to wait again?

 

[OrangeKoi]

"Is it live?"

Well, yes, at this point I'd dare say it's live. I'm sure the bacteria on the top layer is full and working. It does have the crushed coral on the top. I think I'll siphon that off separately as best I can. Unfortunately I listened to someone who does things a little too cheap and put in quite alot of that fine sand that you get at the hardware store which does not bubble with the vinegar test. So who knows how deep the life goes. There couldn't be much O2 past 1 inch. You can see color changes down to about that point.

I did just get a queen conch and I don't know how that critter affects things down below. I just saw it out from under the sand though during the day it is covered.

 

[E.J. Coral]

Yeah, i would wait a good amount of time, as you will probably have a good amount of die-off in the sand.

Nothing wrong with fine hardware store sand .... always used it in my DSB tanks ...

 

[OrangeKoi]

Do you really think so?

So maybe I should just put it all back in then? Or some of it anyway eh?