In need of advice

[Tsev03]

So I've had a 30 gal tank set up for a year and half and I'm up grading to a 125. I started curing the new rock a few months ago. I used half new sand and half live sand to hurry the cycle. That was 3 weeks ago. I also took a few pieces of live rock out of my small tank to put in the big. The question is can I now move every thing from my 30 to the big tank? I have about 50 lbs of live rock, 5 fish, an anemone, a clean up crew, and some soft coral.

 

[jpontier212]

So I've had a 30 gal tank set up for a year and half and I'm up grading to a 125. I started curing the new rock a few months ago. I used half new sand and half live sand to hurry the cycle. That was 3 weeks ago. I also took a few pieces of live rock out of my small tank to put in the big. The question is can I now move every thing from my 30 to the big tank? I have about 50 lbs of live rock, 5 fish, an anemone, a clean up crew, and some soft coral.

What are the parameters in the big tank? IMO you need more live rock. At least another 40lbs. Just to be safe

 

[Tahoe61]

As long as you are testing for ammonia and nitrites and those values are in-dectable, with nitrates levels low then the tank may have cycled but without those values it's a guessing game.
You could add some bacteria in a bottle to speed things up, personally I like Microbacter7 or Dr.Tims products.

Consider moving some of the cuc over and if they do well, move over a soft coral and see how it does.

 

[Tsev03]

I had 50 lbs of dry rock that I cured and then put in the big tank. I'll be adding the live rock out of the small tank to that so that will give me a total of 100 lbs.
parameters are
Ammonia 0
Nitrite 0
Nitrate 50
PO4 .5
But I haven't done a water change yet

 

[Tsev03]

I have had some snails and crabs in the big tank for a week now and they are all doing fine

 

[Tahoe61]

I would do a water change and proceed with moving the stuff over.

Congrats on your upgrade. :-)

 

[Tsev03]

Thank you

 

[ahiggins]

Keep in mind that 50 is still pretty high, especially for a nem.
Even if you do a 50% water change (of a 125 gallon!!!) youll only knock back your nitrates to 25 ppm.
Your fish and some soft/lps corals can tolerate that. IMO you need to get those down before the nem goes in.
Do you have a nitrate reactor? I put one on my nano cube (because Im overstocked lol) and it knocked my 50 ppm down to 5ppm within 2 weeks. Now I just maintain :) that and my skimmer was the best investment LOL

 

[Tsev03]

I added a whole bottle of bacteria over the first week. Not sure what brand it was

 

[Tsev03]

i have not ran the skimmer or the reactor yet. I will plug them in tonight. Then do a big water change and wait a few days and test then move the stuff

 

[ahiggins]

I added a whole bottle of bacteria over the first week. Not sure what brand it was

Bottled bacteria will aid the nitrate cycle. ie ammonia->nitrite->nitrate BUT it stops at nitrate. The bacteria only break down ammonia.

i have not ran the skimmer or the reactor yet. I will plug them in tonight. Then do a big water change and wait a few days and test then move the stuff

I think thats a great idea. Just know that the reactor will take a week (or up to 3 weeks) to get going and build a biological colony inside it. The skimmer should help too :)
test test test LOL I think I spend more time testing than I do enjoying!

 

[jpontier212]

i have not ran the skimmer or the reactor yet. I will plug them in tonight. Then do a big water change and wait a few days and test then move the stuff

I agree with Tahoe. Congrats

 

[Duke4Life]

Is your 125g 6ft long?

 

[Tsev03]

Is your 125g 6ft long?

Yes

 

[Duke4Life]

Yes

Your probably going to want another 40+ pounds of rock, unless you like it open. Have a 125 myself and have been contemplating adding more.

 

[Tsev03]

Your probably going to want another 40+ pounds of rock, unless you like it open. Have a 125 myself and have been contemplating adding more.

I am hoping to get some more soon. For now I have a block of marine pure in my sump.

 

[Duke4Life]

I am hoping to get some more soon. For now I have a block of marine pure in my sump.

For coral placement was actually my reason behind that :p The height being more than the width makes scaping a bit trickier I think, in the process of redoing mine.

 

[Tsev03]

For coral placement was actually my reason behind that :p The height being more than the width makes scaping a bit trickier I think, in the process of redoing mine.

I don't have that problem yet. I can't afford much coral

 

[john.m.cole3]

I am hoping to get some more soon. For now I have a block of marine pure in my sump.

the marinepure brick is awesome. you will be fine with that in your sump. I laid mine horizontally so that it is in a lower flow zone. Lower flow creates more anoxic areas where the bacteria that consume nitrates live. the only thing is that you'll have to be patient. I think it takes time to get the denitrifying bacteria established. My guess is around 6 months. But, that's a pure guess. (a marine PURE guess, lol)

 

[Tsev03]

It's been almost a month and I still haven't moved anything to the big tank. Stuff just kept going wrong. When I put my skimmer in sump and plugged it in nothing happened. It took forever to fix the pump. I had never worked on one before. Then I had a leak in my return jet. For a few hours I thought it was my tank leaking. So thankful it was just the return jet. I was able to get my nitrate down to 10 and phosphate down to .25 by doing water changes and putting some of the macro algae in the display tank. Man it grew like crazy in there. I added a lot of pods to sump yesterday. Now the real work begins, moving every thing to the big tank. I'm still a little worried about my nem. The small tank has 0 nitrates and .10 phosphate. I'm pretty sure that nitrates in small tank got over 10 when I added the big clowns to the small tank but they did not stay there for long.