Moving soon..need to bring reef tank...HELP

[Lin]

Hi all,

I'm going to be moving next weekend, have a 26 gal. bow reef tank and sump that has been set up for about 18 months and doing GREAT! I'm in panic over disrupting everything for the move. Thankfully we are not going far, next town over and I'm planning on bring the tank as the last part of the move to lessen the time of disruption. My brother-in-law is helping me and he has moved a 90 gal salt water fish tank (without corals) and had no problem so I'm hoping his expertise will help. My question for all of you is....right now I live in Manchester, NH and have city water which I have been R/Oing for my tank change water. Manchester water is very soft and where Im moving to Goffstown, NH I will have well water which is much harder water. #1, should I bring enough city water with me so I can blend the two waters for awhile so as not to shock the tank, or would it be fine to just use the new well water as long as I R/O it? The well water has been tested, all is well with the well water (no pun intended! LOL) just much higher in minerals. Will the minerals and hardness be taken out enough by just R/Oing the new water?
#2 How much water should I leave in my main tank and sump during the move to keep my critteres in the sand bed etc. alright during the move. Thank God I have a small enough tank, but is 2" enough?

#3 Going to save the water from the tank during the move to be added when I set it back up as I have been told this is what to do, correct? Will also have plenty of fresh salt water in case I need to do any water changes within a few days of the move.

Thanks everyone in advance for your help with this....as you can see...very worried about my tank.

Any other suggestions welcomed!

Lin

 

[grundig5]

Hi Lin
I cant be of much help with the water questions, let the filter experts get that one. But I would think that your RO (do you use DI as well?) would be sufficient no matter the source as long as the product is 0 tds.
I recently moved a 50g tank from Massachusetts to NYC and it was surprisingly easy other than lugging the tank up 8 flights of stairs. It is very nerve-wracking in the planning and executing stages, but once its pretty much done you'll realize it wasnt that hard. Just dont rush anything, most fish and coral can handle a bit of moving stress. Its best to have a good amount of made up saltwater at your destination (heated, mixed, aged), bring as much tank water in buckets as you can, and leave just enough water to cover your sandbed. As long as it isnt bitterly cold, the sand bed critters should make it just fine. For your situation, its probably easiest to just put the fish and corals and rocks into buckets and keep them going with some airpumps. Thats all I did. Good luck with everything.

 

[Lin]

Thanks for the advice, I feel better now that all should go well. Just need to know about the new water. I haven't been using the DI part of my R/O-D/I system because it was soooo slow, have the Typhoon III unit. Is this typical or is something wrong with my unit. When I run just the R/O it's much quicker so I've gotten lazy and have just been R/O ing the water but have not had much problems with algae out breaks (finger's crossed!).

 

[phatbob]

I've moved my 29 gal reef a couple of times. I would drain all the water you can, right down to the top of the sand bed. As long as it stays wet, the critters in it will be fine. If you leave more water in, it can slosh around during the move and disturb the sand bed. The less you disturb it, the better. I used my tank water to partially fill two small coolers...one for corals, and one for fish/critters. The remaining water I took with me in water jugs. Live rock, and all the stuff growing on it, will be fine for a short while as long as it doesn't dry out. I put the rock in another container and then soaked some paper towels in tank water and just draped them over the rock to keep it damp. This method worked great for me both times I moved the tank. Everything survived swimmingly (ha ha!), and the tank wasn't even disturbed enough to cause any noticeable cycle after the move.

 

[Rays]

I don't know if the RO is enough, but if you have the DI then by all means use it if your new water is very hard. Also, I don't when the last time you used your DI, but if it hasn't been recently, you'll be surprised how fast it runs during the summer, the water is warmer and runs much quicker.

 

[grundig5]

The DI shouldnt slow production really. Maybe contact airwaterice (I think thats who makes typhoon?) and ask them. THey are always very helpful and know their stuff. Do you have the color changing DI resin?

 

[Lin]

Thanks again for the advice, sure hope all goes as well for me as it has for you during your moves. As to my R/O-D/I , it was during the winter time when I was using it, so good point, it could have been running slower because of the colder water. I'll give it a try again while filling up buckets for fresh salt water for the move.

 

[RayD]

I'll be moving my 120 at the end of the month. I've done several moves and I dread it every time.

It always works out though and I have never lost any livestock doing a move.