Moving to a house - sort of have a plan but need tips

[Capslock]

Hello,

I have a 46 bow with at the moment 3 coral pieces, 1 clown, a handful of crabs and snails, an urchin, a star, and a handful of worms. I have about 50lbs of live rock and about 40 lbs of sand with about 10 gal of water in a sump.

In about a month I will be closing on a house and moving within 2 months. I imagine this might be dreadful to move the tank.

I plan on having about 6 or so 5gal buckets. A couple buckets will house the live rock and sand. I intended one bucket to have the fish, snails, and crabs together. The urchin and the star can go together, and finally the corals can go together (or in seperate bags?) The three corals I have are candy cane, brain worm, and the last I am not 100 percent sure what they are but it is kind of a mix between a fan worm and small button polyps that are yellow?


I am not sure how the logistics will be once I ship them there since I will need to create new water for the water I do not carry with me (or should I just go ahead and try to carry it all?!?) and also the die off I would imagine I would get on the rocks and any death that might occur from the worms and what not.

Basically, I am scared of die off being so much that the ammonia would kill everything if I put it all back into the tank when I move (I will be moving about 15 - 30min away from where I am)

Does anyone have any 'ive done this before' tips?

 

[Scoopy]

I moved a 55 with NO loss. Here are some things I can think to help you.

Get several buckets with lids. Keep as much water as you can. I would go ahead and make 10-15 gal salt water ready to put back in tank just in case.

Drain you water into buckets, then put your live rock in it. Like you said with livestock, they should be allright in the buckets without the rock. The coral you can use a tupperware container and keep it with a passenger in the car.

You do not have to drain the tank completely, having a couple of inches of water should be no big deal if you have someone to help you move it.

You shouldnt have to drain the sump all the way either, if you can leave your sandbeds in tact, it will be much better when you go to put it all back together. The less you disturb the sand the better. (put your water back in SLOW) Just trying to keep you from having a worse cloudy tank than you are already. Same for teh sump and complete drainage, as long as your sand has just enough water to cover it, it will be fine, I would just move it in the tank/sump that its already in.

When you get there, reverse process... take teh rock out, drain buckets back in, add new salt water if needed for topoff, or use it all and dump the rest like a water change.

Add livestock, then coral.

30 minute drive should result in NO loss. A few hours should result in No loss if done right. Hope this helps

Sam

 

[mr_X]

sounds like a good plan. i moved a 125's contents in the same manner. i did lose a couple shrimp, but it was an acceptable loss.

i kept everything submerged as best as i could.

i didn't move the sand bed though. i kept some to seed the new, but i removed the old bed. depending on the age of your tank, it could be a dangerous situation, stirring that up.

 

[Capslock]

The tank has been in operation since October 07 and it took about a month before I started to put critters in it - i would guess that is relatively young.

I am glad to hear I have an ok plan.

 

[Capslock]

I am also wondering: should I transport as much water as possible or only what would be needed to transport my aquarium life?