Short Move, best way to do it?

P

Particleman

AC Members
Oct 23, 2004
86
0
0
Irvine, CA
Hello..

I'd like to get some opinions on how to best move an established tank. In the next month I will be moving into a new house which is about an hour's drive away from where I currently live. I have a 55Gal, with 60lbs of live rock, 50lbs of sand, 5 fish, snails, crabs, etc. No corals just some halimida and shaving brush plants. Anyway this was my idea for moving...

Put the live rock in a separate bucket and covering it with existing tank water. Bag the macroalgae with some water. Put the sand in a separate bucket with tank water. As for the fish, I have a 10 Gal quarantine tank that I could setup and just use that as a way to transport the fish using a battery operated pump. Figured I'd just fill it with the tank water and do the transfer.

Once I get the tank to the new place, set it all up, fill it with new saltwater and put it all back together. Should I let it run like that for a while before I put the fish back in? Any advice would be appreciated, should I not even use the quarantine tank and just bag the fish instead. Will things be ok for like an hour or two like that?

Thanks
 
Bagging the fish, or putting them in a cooler, will be preferable--tanks with water in them shouldn't be moved. If there won't be a lot of carrying them around, coolers are fine, but bagging them, putting the bags in the coolers, then packing around them to prevent the bags from rolling is best if they'll be moving around lots. Once you have them at the new place, open the bags to allow for gas exchange, and they'll be okay. I'd run the setup long enough to come up to temp, and test for ammonia right away (sometimes turning the sand over can cause spikes--I'd almost prefer taking some plugs of the sand to see the new setup and putting in all new sand).
 
well I was actually planning on adding another 40 lbs or so of sand when i moved the aquarium. The tank dosen't need to be torn down for 30 days, perhaps I could pull out all but a small amount of sand from the tank, let it just die off/dry-out over the next few weeks then rinse it, soak it and use it like new sand? I'll just bag the fish then,was more worried about causing a spike when i mix up the sand from the move, thats why i was going to just use the 10 gal as holding tank.
 
Nah, you'd be better off bagging a little of the sand up in s.w. Then replaice with all new sand at the new location. You'll have quite a bit of die off between there and the new location and it will defeat the purpose of the dsb. Make sure you catch as many of the critters that live there as you can and move them in a serperate bag to their new home. for worms etc just include with sand that will be lots easier. The sand mostly does denitrification so water changes will help you stay on top of nitrate issues until the new sand bed is ready to go.
 
Do not move a full aquarium of any size, my friend. Use bags with double rubberbands and drop them in a styro container or cooler. For an hour move with prized fish, I would rent a small oxygen tank from a med supply house; they're pretty cheap.
PM, I'm not sure of the value/hardiness of your specimens but IMO you would be better off locating the fish to a trusted LFS or fellow hobbyist system for a while if possible until things stabilize in your display. Not saying you cannot move the fish as planned, but IME capturing them can be very stressful in itself, and moving them to an unstable system can result in losses. At any rate, good luck with it.
 
I know this is an old thread and I'm new to the forum. I did a search on moving tanks in the marine section and didn't find the answer to my question. If I missed something that's been talked about, I apologize.

Right now I have a 30 gallon FOWLR aquarium. I'm attending graduate school in August so I have plenty of time to plan things out still. I am moving my tank inhabitants with me since I'll be at that living situation for at least 2 years. I live an hour and a half to two hours away and I'm debating the best, easiest way to move my tank. I eventually want to upgrade my tank since I can't put more than one more fish in there, and would like to get a 75+ gallon tank. My question is, for ease of moving the tank that far, would it be better to wait to upgrade or would it actually be easier to upgrade the tank and let it cycle then move my fish?

I'd really love to upgrade the tank, but I'm looking for a little bit more helpful advice than that which I'm getting from stores that seem like they are trying to make money from me instead of offering up unbiased suggestions. Not to mention, I'm not sure those I am talking to at the places I can buy fish know what they are talking about.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
AquariaCentral.com
Top Bottom