How to move a Reef?

[jerehmy]

Hi-

I have a 40g reef with a 20g sump/fuge. In November I will be moving to a new house and need to move my tank.

I will be upgrading to a 50t so I will need to tranfer the sand and all 70lbs or LR.

whats the best detailed way to do this without losing any corals/fish?

I was thinking of setting up a 29g with a powerhead and heater as a holding cell for all the corals/fish for a few hrs untill I aquascape the new tank for a few hrs what do you think?


PLEASE HELP!!!!

[itz frank]

i believe most people use new trashcans or plastic storage tubs. It'll be like 20 bucks for 3-4 tubs and you can keep your fish in one and lr in another with sand.

[jerehmy]

will I have any problems when I remove the sand from one tank to another??

[TomDe]

I would set up a QT tank in advance and get the levels the same so you can move your fish and corals to it and take time setting up the tank.

The sand probably be cloudy for a little while so setting up a holding tank is what I would do.

[jerehmy]

well I will be saving the water for a while so the holding tank will be the same as the reef!

come onm Bertoni where you at!?!?!

[Gimplar]

i agree, save the water...definetly and even set up your holding tank right before you move your tank as well. Really depends how many days you have to move. because afte rmoving all the sand, your water will be all cloudy. I've moved a 125 and it took about 3 days to get everything up and running. as far as transporint fish/corals, i used clean 5 or 7 gallon buckets with air pumps. everything lived and is still doing great.

[jerehmy]

yeah I will for sure do the 5g buckets and air pumps! I have as much time as I need to move not a problem


and college is more money if you know good reefers who hook it up :)

[Randall_James]

If it all possible, you need to get the new tank setup and running.

I would go so far as to set up the old tank and refuge at the new location in a temporary spot until you can get the new tank running and cycled.

Moving your reef and changing tanks at the same time is going to ask a lot of your livestock..

Set up new tank with mostly new substrate and a couple cups of the old to seed it. Move the majority of your live rock to the new tank and let it age a bit with some fish food to feed bacteria.

Allow your old system to run in its temporary spot for a week or so while the new system settles down a bit.

Hopefully your live rock will keep this cycle process down to a few days (a week maybe?)

The corals are not any type of load for the tank so you could move them pretty quickly, the fish however should be moved one or 2 at a time and allow the tank to adjust to the load for at least a few days.

Reusing the water itself only saves having to mix new water. The bacteria is not free floating and so it will not really aid that much in the cycle process. The rock and substrate do that. The majority of the nitrifying bacteria live on surface area, not free swimming.

[sbgreen]

I used paint buckets from home depot with the lids that secure. i filled each one partially and put rock in each one. it worked perfectly.

[jerehmy]

if you change from a smaller tank to a bigger tank there is no cycle especialy if you use the same LR and LS

what cycle will i have?? None!