I'm moving a 55 gallon fish tank to a new apartment. How can I do it? Do I save the water and the filter? How long do I let it cycle for before adding the fish? I figure I can only keep the fish in buckets for a day before I need to put them in an established tank. Will the cycled filter be enough running for a day with all new water or am I in trouble?
moving, how do i transfer fish?
- Thread starter ecuaaron
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if you save your filter and its media, and have the same plants, gravel/substrate, decor, etc. you should be fine. how far are you moving and what fish do you have? most likely, you can get away with using a rubbermaid container or what i used is a 5 gal. bucket with a lid. You would fare best keeping the filter media wet so as not to kill the bacteria that keeps up your bioload
thx for the info, i have a TT and peacock eel, and some community fish I'm not too concerned about, would stink to lose them, but most concerned about the eels and an old red-teil shark, should I try to save some of the water and let the tank cycle for a few hours before adding the fish back in?
No. If you keep the nitrifying bacteria alive in the filter, it's actually best to get the fish back in fairly quick so that the bacteria does not starve. Keep the water you keep the fish in and what you use to keep the filter media wet, the rest will be fine as long as you remember to dechlorinate and match temperature.
There's a few articles that deal with moving, this one looked good:
http://www.monsterfishkeepers.com/forums/showthread.php?t=89557
From what I've read, a 50% water change during the move is not unheard of, so plan on carting 25 or more gallons of water with you. Also, I've seen other posts refer to moving the fish in a well cleaned-out cooler lined with trash bags (double- or triple-bagged).
Christiaan
http://www.monsterfishkeepers.com/forums/showthread.php?t=89557
From what I've read, a 50% water change during the move is not unheard of, so plan on carting 25 or more gallons of water with you. Also, I've seen other posts refer to moving the fish in a well cleaned-out cooler lined with trash bags (double- or triple-bagged).
Christiaan
Just don't leave water in the tank. I burst a seam in a 55 with not quite 3 inches of water in it going around a damn corner once. Just covering the substrate seems to be okay, but not much more. When it sloshes it can put huge amounts of strain on the seams.
yeah should be easy. just keep your filter media submerged in old tank water. when you get to the new place, set up the tank, dechlorinate the water BEFORE you get your filters going, make sure temp/ph is close to the same, drop in the fish and your done!!
yeah, get yourself a cheap 100w power inverter from walmart for like $15. that way you can plug in your air pump while in the car. tearing down/setting up a tank takes time and you can lose fish. i lost some expensive fish for being cheap/lazy about an air pump. its a good investmentecuaaron;3130668;3130668 said: