Moving a Tank

Sabra616

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Hi all I am about to move a red sea 250 from a friends house to mine. It is loaded to the gills with coral and fish. I plan on putting all of the live stock in a bin for a few days until I get the tank back up and running at my house. Should I mix all new saltwater for the temp bin that is holding the livestock or should I try and use exclusively tank water from the established tank. I plan on adding all the rock work corals and fish to the temp bin with air stones flow some sort of carbon filtration until the tank is re setup. Thank you all Happy Reefing!!
 

brandon429

why did you put a reef in that
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what you do with the old sand matters the most. It’s ok to mix all new water matching temp and salinity from the old water, or 50/50

either way is fine. You need to tap water rinse the old sand as we’ve done here in the tank transfer thread. Study it a couple hours, know the procedure it’s the safest move you can do.


if you skip tap water rinsing of the old sand, or the new sand you may elect to use, that’s where big problems can happen you can see on first post where a collection of non rinsed setups is posted. Wreckage

for all other years in the thread of tank moves and sandbed swaps, perfect outcomes result from following the pre rinse rules.
 
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Sabra616

Sabra616

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what you do with the old sand matters the most. It’s ok to mix all new water matching temp and salinity from the old water, or 50/50

either way is fine. You need to tap water rinse the old sand as we’ve done here in the tank transfer thread. Study it a couple hours, know the procedure it’s the safest move you can do.


if you skip tap water rinsing of the old sand, or the new sand you may elect to use, that’s where big problems can happen you can see on first post where a collection of non rinsed setups is posted. Wreckage

for all other years in the thread of tank moves and sandbed swaps, perfect outcomes result from following the pre rinse rules.
Thank you I pan on getting rid of the sand all together. I am going to run this tank with a bare bottom.
 

brandon429

why did you put a reef in that
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Ok nice that’s easy then. You just move it all w no sand, the rocks will carry the same bioload that rocks and sand used to carry. In no way whatsoever does removing sand remove crucial bacteria…it removed extra, unneeded bacteria that compete for systemic resources, the rocks are instantly ready to resume after the move.


don’t blast light full power next day, do a week ramp up back to the current power levels. It’ll work great. In that thread above we do mainly all new water in every job, matching temp and salinity. If you want to re use some current water that’s fine, either way is ok since this isn’t an invasion fix that current tank water is fine to re use but only the portion drawn off at the start, the lower portions of current water will be cloudy with mess as the tank drains and things are being lifted out
 

jda

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I agree to use as much tank water as you can in the coral bins. Have some backup water and bins just in case - don't toss any water and have some extra fresh just on hand. Die off can happen in bins and if it does, it escalates like an avalanche. More places to put things are always a good idea. If you don't need it, then great.

Any rock area that was in the sand and had anoxic bacteria will probably start to die in the bin. Just be aware of this - it had developed to be in an area with no oxygen (submerged in the sand) and now it will have plenty of oxygen. It is impossible to know how fast this will happen. It is inevitable and I hope that you never notice, but you changed the ecosystem and it will need to adapt, at least in these areas. If your rock has diverse life, some of this life can also die that is living in the rock and won't be able to make it for long without the sand - again, this might not be much, but it can happen. If you were having sand in the new tank, my normal advice is to pay attention to these areas and put them back in the sand. if these rocks that were in the sand do not have any coral on them, then keeping all of them in their own bin for observation is smart.

Moves are hard, depending on the coral. You will probably lose something so don't take it personally. Don't chase or risk everything else for one coral.

It will really help if you stop feeding the fish for a day or two before the move. Less fish waste in the bins will make things easier.

Be smart and this will be mostly fine. If you have easier corals, then it could go quite well.
 

brandon429

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Sabra

none of your live rock is going to die. Not any section, not to any degree you can measure those are simply made up risks above to detract from the massive proof thread prior showing no harm.




if you will move over clean surfaces that don’t have attached waste everything will go fine. You can rinse off any area of live rock in clean saltwater to ensure no detritus rides over into your setup at home.


Detritus and particulate waste transfer is the only risk, we show in pattern. Can’t wait to see your updates after the move, it’ll go fine. Nothing is going to recycle at all if you move over no detritus.

Re ramping your light back to the normal levels over one weeks time is the right way to acclimate corals to any new water you might use, and is the correct prep response to the lack of organics within the system caused by removing the sand.
 
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brandon429

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Dont use bottled bacteria for this job, S.

the rocks you’re moving are full up on bacteria and adding some to the water isnt going to help, we’ve excluded bacteria use from every job above. You don’t need to add oxygen-competing bacteria to this job, we do transfers like yours all the time they’re easy and consistent if you move no clouding.



The only time our systems need assistance is during the cycle if we want to speed it up. When dealing with cycled rocks no extra bottle bac is needed. We made it a point to never use it in our work thread above.

The reason false bacteria loss concern is a risk for transfer jobs is because it refocuses effort away from the real risk, detritus and waste transfer, and moves the concern into the #1 aspect not in risk. We did all those jobs without bottle bac because wet rocks retain their bacteria that well.
 
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Big Smelly fish

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I done many tank moves for customers when I was in the business. Alway use 5 gallon buckets to move fish, corals , rock and water.
Being you are going BB you don’t have to worry about sand. I always replace sand during a move.
 

brandon429

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Agreed, and cover containers for fish jumpers. We had a few jumpers in uncovered holding totes.
 

brandon429

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Also to watch out for:

why have we gone seven years in the tank transfer thread never using a non digital ammonia test kit for proofing after a move?

because detritus-free tank moves always turn out ok, we don’t need a spot check by a kit certain to indicate a problem during every move when ran.

moving substrate of any kind causes false danger spikes as nh4 readings on common non digital kits (such as api) and it makes the owners dose Prime or other bottle bac mixes as a reactionary habit, trained by peers, which is more chemical souping vs the clean water we use over and over in the outcome examples.

don’t run non digital ammonia tests if you can’t resist the urge against bacterial fear coming at you from all angles. You’re better of not running them, or even owning the kits.


We manage ammonia accurately in giant work threads through the cycling stage, the running stage, and the transfer stage using several means other than cheap non digital ammonia tests. Our methods get spot checked routinely by seneye owners, that’s how you know the methods are strong. That, and seven years of happy transfer outcome pics on file.
 

CoralB

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If you can afford it have a lfs move it for you as some of your larger operations have the equipment to move your tank and inhabitants with little to no loss . And at the end of the day the tank is completely set up and hooked up when they leave . The company that did mine has a special crew and truck with all the equipment , containers and power supplies . It was two guys and maybe minus drive time it took 3 hrs to remove everything from one place and reset in another . I was impressed and I didn’t have to touch anything plus I got a 50% water change during . I also lucked out with zero losses .
 

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