my wife found a heck of a deal

[liquafaction]

My wife called me from work saying that someone wanted to sell there salty aquarium for 600 bucks, everything included:

fish
snails
crabs
live rock
lights
filtration
stand
and the list goes on.

My question is that I do not like the way he has it set up.... to many techno gizmo components. I want to do a system as natural as possable. Is it possable to slowly remove things without throwing the eco system out of wack? Maybe yalls recomendation would be "if it aint broke don't fix it" I want to buy the tank, but I also want to make some changes if I can, or should. Here is the setup he has

110 gallon tank, undergravel filter system, 4" crushed coral for base, not quite enough live rock for 110 mybe 75-80 lbs. a canister filter, a skimmer, then of course lighting, heater, power heads.

I would like to do away with both filters, and get more live rock. Is this do able? Is the crushed coral ok for base?

He only has 3 fish in it, a gramma, a goby, and something else (dont remember). There is a cleanup crew, a few snails, and hermits.

[VoodooChild]

Removing the filters would be fine, just make sure the powerheads have enough flow to turn the tank over 10X an hour or so. You could replace the CC bed with sand, but I'd do that slowly, or perhaps, leave the bottom layer in there to keep some of the bacteria there and put another few inches of sand over it. The live rock should be able to take care of things and it'd be best to do this change whilst the tank is still in limbo. It'd also be better to do this when the fish base is so low, so you'll have less of a risk in loosing something. The LR amount is fine. More won't hurt, but until you start adding more fish you can do that slowly or wait a bit. One thing to do for sure though, is to do frequent checks on ammonia, nitrite, and nitrate, to make sure that you aren't re-cycling, or that the bacteria can't handle the current load until a new population builds up. Good luck!

[mogurnda]

I think it can be done, but take your time. Transit time is a great opportunity, especially with just a few fish. Remove about half of the CC and replace with playsand, like VoodooChild said. I might also suggest that you mix the CC in with the sand, at least somewhat. If all the CC is buried, it may kill the nitrifying bacteria, which are aerobic.

Because you'll lose a lot of bacteria with the CC being removed, I'd keep the canister for a little extra biofiltration for the moment. It's easy to take off when you're sure that there's not another cycle going on. When you're sure things are OK, add more cured live rock if you want.

In the meantime, definitely watch NH3 and NO2, and maybe have a garbage can full of seawater mixed up in case you get a spike and need water changes in a hurry.

Good luck. Great deal!

[wayne]

Assuming you're going to take it home, you can do it. You're going to have to take it all to pieces anyway. How far/ long? If it's not far it's the same as moving house and lots of people do that (inc. me next month, groan).
Anyway pull out the live rock, put in buckets with fish, keep it wet and thus minimise die off. Pull out water , sand ( I don't know coarse it is, but of he's running a UGravel it's probabbly very coarse , so certainly thin it out. Move house, rebuild with freshwater and hope the cycles not big (it shouldn't be if you're careful). MAybe keep all fish in smaller tank while you're making sure main tank cycles
75 - 80 lbs is plenty to support the bioload from 3 fish. Check out his aquascaping. If you can get it scapedd so theres good watermovement all around you don't need so much - this usually means trying to get the aquascape more vertical and less 'low pile of rocks'

[liquafaction]

yea, he has the rocks piled up at each end, with a big one in the middle. I really did not like that, and was hoping to spread it out a little. The bad thing is that he has a few corals. I am not super farmiliar with corals, but he said leathers, and the others he could not remember what they were called. It is about a 30-45 minute move. I figured that would not be so bad.

Here is what I decided I want to do (input is welcome) I am going to clean out my 100 gallon that I have had trouble cycling. move everything in buckets to my house and into that tank as fast as possible. I will go back and get the 110 gallan tank and stand, and set that up with a sand base. Mix new water, add a few pieces of live rock, and some of the coral out of the established tank. Let the 110 cycle, then transfer the rest of the live rock and critters, and fish to the feshly cycled tank.