question on moving tank

angel41

New Member
hi, I'm all new to this and I don't know exactly how to do it. Have anybody move tanks from one house to another?please help. Is it safe to do it by ourself. I bought an 85 gallon fish tank that includes everything in the tank, including some fish and corals and live rocks. can someone help me and tell me what I should do to move them to my house. It takes about 15-20 drive .I would really appreciate the input. thanks.
 
First off have plenty of replacement water at the new location. Get a big trash can and have your saltwater already mixed up and ready for you at the new location. I just did this 2 weeks ago with a 55 gal and ended up replacing about 25gal of water in it. Get out a lot of the water already in the tank before you start taking things out so you can reuse it, if you move the rock first it will make the reusable water dirtier. Have plenty of cooler, totes, buckets to move stuff. The live rock and water are heavy, we put live rock in the bottom of totes and only added what water to it we could carry and put damp paper towels over the rest of the live rock. Do the rock first. I had a 6pack cooler that I put the fish in but there was only two in this tank. Also we didn't net them we coaxed them into cups of water so it would hopefully stress them less not ever being out of the water. The last thing we did was scoop the live sand up and into a cooler with wheels so it was easier to move. Have plenty of help moving the tank and stand as well as the totes. When you get to the new place do your stand then tank of course, I then put my live sand back in and covered it with a trash bag big plate and bowl and started pouring water into the bowl as to not stir up the sand. Add your old water first and then your rock and last your fish. Make sure and clean the filters and skimmers off and you can gently shake off the live rock to remove loose debris before putting them back into the tank. Make sure the salinity of the new water is as close to the same as the old as you can get. I didn't loose either fish so we must have done a great job. It is a huge job so be prepared for the work at hand. My mom and I did it an in total it prolly took us from first jug of water to totally set up about 5 hours or so and I live about 15 to 20 minutes from her. We hauled everything in the back of her dually except the fish! GOOD LUCK and I hope this helps!!! OH wear some kind of gloves when handling the live rock!
 

angel41

New Member
you said to take out the sand also, would that mess up the sand bed and make all the water parameters go crazy?and how do you handle the fish, do you just put them in a cooler with the old water?
 
Get all the water out you can before doing the sand that way it's as clean as possible. I used a net to coax the fish into a cup and used water from the tank in the cooler to put them in. So far my levels have been fine. Trust me you don't want to try to move the tank with the sand in it it makes it super heavy and the bottom may break. I read you could put a board under it if you wanted to but I didn't want to chance having to buy an new 55 gal tank on a Sunday! LOL
 

angel41

New Member
if we take out the sand and then put it back in the tank and then put the old water back in, would that make an ammonia spike or nitrite spike , b/c I read somewhere that this person was cleaning the tank and maybe somehow hit an ammonia pocket in the sand or something and all the fish died in the tank. would that cause the same thing ? and I heard that we shouldn't mess with the sand bed. I don't know. is that something different like cleaning or something inside the live fish tank that would cause that to happen? I haven't done the moving yet, not until the weekend. thanks again.
 
E

eric b 125

Guest
I have removed my sandbed before so that I could put the tank on its side to drill it. I reused the sand and it was okay. I just kept a close eye on water parameters and had extra water ready. Not saying this was a good idea, just saying that I've done it with no noticeable effects.
 

angel41

New Member
okay, I'll do that then, b/c the sand bed is really thick like 4-5 inches and I don't want to risk of breaking the glass either. Thanks.
 
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