Connecting Established Reef To New Tank

Tuffloud1

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EDIT:

In conclusion, if using the method I did - connecting an established reef to a new system with dry rock (clean), I recommend the following:

1. Dose your new tank prior to connecting to your old tank with NO3 and PO4 enough to raise to your established tank levels.

2. Take your skimmer and filter socks offline (or don’t clean them) until your NO3 and PO4 are stable and consistently matches established tank prior to connecting.

2. Don’t freak out if you have a bacterial bloom in the beginning, it will clear up after a day or so.

3. Overfeed your tank (assuming new system is substantially larger) in the beginning as the additional water volume has diluted your system but watch NO3 and especially PO4 closely.

4. Don’t run lighting on the new tank during this process.

5. Obviously, monitor your alk, calcium, mag and adjust dosing as needed and be sure to dose the new tank up/down to established tank levels prior to connecting.


I would like to document my observations of this process here for the reefing community to learn from.


Below is my 6 year old established reef. It is a 90 gallon tank with 20 gallons in the sump.

B21EEB05-9C52-4B18-8838-C78FA0F3A920.jpeg


I am going to connect this system to my new 262 gallon in wall tank with 60 gallon sump.

2415BEC7-87B4-4420-820D-1F9CC5EF7B3A.jpeg



This tank will have dry, rinsed sand and reef saver dry rock.

FF7A5490-1142-4332-8F21-10BBECBFA4FC.jpeg

C8A62317-9192-481C-AE42-3A4F1344A1ED.jpeg

0EE45BDF-5F09-4510-B16D-FED87A033F74.jpeg


No bottled bacteria will be added during this process. The goal is to transport bacteria from my established reef to my new system by means of connecting the two systems together with plumbing.
 
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Entomophage

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That new tank is awesome! I'm very curious to see if you have any "ugly" phase at all.

Have you considered running the new system independently for a while and testing params to protect your established system from any potential ammonia spike? If the rocks are fresh and don't have any dead organics it's probably not a big concern, but I'd be nervous about destabilizing a healthy, mature system.
 

piranhaman00

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Interesting. I am adding a about 40lbs of completely dry rock to my 180 and I am soaking it before hand with bottled bacteria.

With such a large volume of un cycled system mixing with the small 90 gallon, I think you have the potential to run into major problems. There could easily be dead stuff on the rocks and you could crash your mature system.

I would personally run the large system by itself and monitor params before mixing the two.
 
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Tuffloud1

Tuffloud1

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That new tank is awesome! I'm very curious to see if you have any "ugly" phase at all.

Have you considered running the new system independently for a while and testing params to protect your established system from any potential ammonia spike? If the rocks are fresh and don't have any dead organics it's probably not a big concern, but I'd be nervous about destabilizing a healthy, mature system.

I regard the connection of the two systems together similar to a large water change.

Since the rock is dry without dead critters and the sand is dry and rinsed, I don’t expect any significant ammonia.

I expect a bacterial bloom will happen after the two systems are connected and then clear out.
 
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Tuffloud1

Tuffloud1

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Interesting. I am adding a about 40lbs of completely dry rock to my 180 and I am soaking it before hand with bottled bacteria.

With such a large volume of un cycled system mixing with the small 90 gallon, I think you have the potential to run into major problems. There could easily be dead stuff on the rocks and you could crash your mature system.

I would personally run the large system by itself and monitor params before mixing the two.

I considered this, but since I am using dry rock without decay and dry sand rinsed, I don’t believe that it will destabilize my system enough to cause a crash.

I believe that the bacteria will begin colonizing the new tank quickly and I expect things will stabilize fairly quickly.

I will post test results as they unfold.
 

piranhaman00

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I regard the connection of the two systems together similar to a large water change.

Since the rock is dry without dead critters and the sand is dry and rinsed, I don’t expect any significant ammonia.

I expect a bacterial bloom will happen after the two systems are connected and then clear out.

I wouldnt expect any either. I dont expect any PO4 and NH4 from the rock I am adding to my tank but why risk it? I would be a lot more cautious with such a beautiful mature tank.

I am curious to the see results. I hope I am wrong :)
 

brandon429

why did you put a reef in that
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this experiment will close the matter on whether or not significant levels of bacteria are found in reef water. Ive seen claims to each extreme - none/some/lots and within 30 days we'll know based on this. it would take a lot of shared bac to colonize the new surface area enough to show ammonia movement down overnite from a given starting point reference in the new tank, after being unlinked.

after the test is rendered you are moving the rest of the rocks over on top of these?



Here is yet another reef tank cycled solely on bacteria from reef water
 
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piranhaman00

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this experiment will close the matter on whether or not significant levels of bacteria are found in reef water. Ive seen claims to each extreme - none/some/lots and within 30 days we'll know based on this. it would take a lot of shared bac to colonize the new surface area enough to show ammonia movement down overnite from a given starting point reference.

Who says the water column contains a lot of bacteria? If this were true, UV would be terrible for and aquarium.
 

brandon429

why did you put a reef in that
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:)

then that means after 30 days linked, the unlinked new system can take an input of 1 ppm ammonia and it wont go down, for days. test= on!

pico reefers change all the water and don't suffer from coral growth issues, UV is nicer to water in that a burn isn't like a 100% water change.

both methods grow coral, and reef water has copious bac riding rafts (planktors) in suspension. water shear and inherent shedding/distribution systems repopulate clean water endlessly. doesn't matter how its cleaned, it gets dirty cyclically

my vote is the test will show ammonia movement down, to any degree means the new system is cycled since live sand and that live rock above is massive surface area.

if sampled, nearly everyone would agree the water is low/insignificant to bac transfer.

thats why this experiment stands out, it will end the matter fully. if it cannot move ammonia down I will require counseling to re adjust back into reefing society
 
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Tuffloud1

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I will connect the two systems for 30 days, test for ammonia, then I will disconnect the new system from the old, test for ammonia, then dose small amount of ammonia at night and then retest ammonia in the morning.

If the reading is 0, this means that bacteria from the established system has transferred to the new system by connection alone and the cycle is established.
 

brandon429

why did you put a reef in that
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here is a very influential person stating in clear terms, reef water has no filtration bac:




in all fairness nobody is meaning to unfairly challenge Dr. Tim.

I watch web patterns online for 20 yrs and can sniff out a good comparison challenge as they arise, I myself would like a definitive measure on the matter

Tuff's intended setup happens to be a great way to measure claims I noticed.

though I think the systems will share lots of bac, Im not sure if its enough to pass 30 day eval.

I truly dont know if the measured unlinked system will pass, I just think it will as the totality of what Ive seen. and from doing exactly this in freshwater systems/ but Ive never seen it simply measured for marine systems.

if the new system can pass ammonia oxidation off linkage only, then a statement from that above w be in challenge.

a recent bacteria prediction I got wrong was thinking that bottle bac dont ever need to be fed after being dosed. To test that claim, Dr Reef set up 1 year ago a dry system vessel, dosed only with bottle bac, never fed with ammonia.

at about 14 mos testing it couldnt move ammonia down overnight. Id have bet a thousand bucks it could lol.
 
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ScottB

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If you folks have not seen @Tuffloud1 build thread do so. It is awesome!

A couple thoughts/prognostications:
a) Should not be a cycle. Will be a very typical, dry setup, uglies phase.
b) Biggest risk is to the 90G acros struggling with nutrient deficiency. Big risk IMO.
c) Next biggest risk is dinoflagellates, but they will only inhabit the new tank, not the old one. Still, they will strip the nutrient out of the water, contributing to risk # b.

If any of you have spent as much time in the Dino thread as me, you've likely watched me go through this scenario. Three times. Every. Single. Time that I added a tank to an existing system it broke out with dinos (ostreopsis thankfully).

Here is what I would do:
a) Plumb it for the long term. Absurd not to connect these two gorgeous tanks.
b) Plumb it for the short term also (with isolating gate valves. Sorry, extra work.) **edit** I see u planned already for this
c) Run them as separate systems, but transfer over some rock, sand, whatever media you can spare to the sterile tank.
d) I don't know your stance on WCs, but once a week I would open the valves to run them as combined for, say an hour.
e) Feed the living daylights out of your 90. You just did a 100% WC. (I would skip Aminos as dinos crave them.)
f) Load up both systems with fish as fast as is safe. Dose bac if you have to on the new tank.
g) Buy buckets of NO3 and PO4 and set up your dosers beforehand. Keep careful measures of nutrients and ALK.
h) Be prepared to apply UV to the affected display tank temporarily.
i) Dry skim. No GFO, no carbon dosing. Run it so dirty your Mom would be disappointed in you.

Points G and H are kinda tricky as to where in my scenario they should be installed. Probably the UV should be on the "new" and the NO3 and PO4 dosing on the "old" where your acros are.

Apologise if this reads bossypants or know-it-all. But I have seen this movie even more times than I have lived it.
 
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Tuffloud1

Tuffloud1

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If you folks have not seen @Tuffloud1 build thread do so. It is awesome!

A couple thoughts/prognostications:
a) Should not be a cycle. Will be a very typical, dry setup, uglies phase.
b) Biggest risk is to the 90G acros struggling with nutrient deficiency. Big risk IMO.
c) Next biggest risk is dinoflagellates, but they will only inhabit the new tank, not the old one. Still, they will strip the nutrient out of the water, contributing to risk # b.

If any of you have spent as much time in the Dino thread as me, you've likely watched me go through this scenario. Three times. Every. Single. Time that I added a tank to an existing system it broke out with dinos (ostreopsis thankfully).

Here is what I would do:
a) Plumb it for the long term. Absurd not to connect these two gorgeous tanks.
b) Plumb it for the short term also (with isolating gate valves. Sorry, extra work.) **edit** I see u planned already for this
c) Run them as separate systems, but transfer over some rock, sand, whatever media you can spare to the sterile tank.
d) I don't know your stance on WCs, but once a week I would open the valves to run them as combined for, say an hour.
e) Feed the living daylights out of your 90. You just did a 100% WC. (I would skip Aminos as dinos crave them.)
f) Load up both systems with fish as fast as is safe. Dose bac if you have to on the new tank.
g) Buy buckets of NO3 and PO4 and set up your dosers beforehand. Keep careful measures of nutrients and ALK.
h) Be prepared to apply UV to the affected display tank temporarily.
i) Dry skim. No GFO, no carbon dosing. Run it so dirty your Mom would be disappointed in you.

Points G and H are kinda tricky as to where in my scenario they should be installed. Probably the UV should be on the "new" and the NO3 and PO4 dosing on the "old" where your acros are.

Apologise if this reads bossypants or know-it-all. But I have seen this movie even more times than I have lived it.

Thanks for all your insight, I really appreciate it!

I absolutely expect a huge drop in nitrates when the two systems of water combine and the nitrates are diluted down to practically nothing.

Currently, my nitrates on the 90 fluctuate between 2.5 - 5 ppm.

I will likely dose with nitrates to keep in that range so my acros don’t starve.
 
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Tuffloud1

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this experiment will close the matter on whether or not significant levels of bacteria are found in reef water. Ive seen claims to each extreme - none/some/lots and within 30 days we'll know based on this. it would take a lot of shared bac to colonize the new surface area enough to show ammonia movement down overnite from a given starting point reference in the new tank, after being unlinked.

after the test is rendered you are moving the rest of the rocks over on top of these?

Correct, after all is done, the 90 will be broken down and all rock, corals, fish will be moved over to the 262.

Since all the plumbing will be in place from linking the two systems together, I will be putting a frag tank in place of the 90.
 

brandon429

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you are preserving nearly all of your microorganism balance plus testing a longstanding claim in the hobby
moving tanks isn't harmful, Jon just did a huge cleaning on a 120 to shine it up


we show in our sand rinse thread how even with full bed rips and tap water rinses, worms and pods simply repopulate back down off the rocks it just takes a while.

plus, so many companies sell refugium charger kits. forty bucks and you age your tank twenty years instantly lol even if you just rip cleaned it of all waste and cloud

your test is verifying the impacts from adding a bunch of inert material to a living system. *I do agree there's a pattern of dinos using dry rock systems but yours is an interesting 180 degree difference, starting from full purple live rock/not a dry start. I think that protects you better than common dry starts

if those rocks have phosphates to liberate during in-tank curing then that can be measured and assessed.
 
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