I’m currently in the process of purchasing a 90 gallon reef setup. There are no fish currently living in this, but would like some tips on how to transport without damaging the enviroment as much as possible. The drive would be less then five miles total, so I don’t think this will cause to much trouble. Here’s what I’ve been thinking:
Drain out as much water as possible while saving it in two large garbage cans. One with the live rock, the other with just water. This way it will eliminate damage.
Transport slowly, since there are no fish, I would really be in no rush to get the tank back up and running. The tank has all the necessities that would be needed to get it up and running the same day.
Unfortunately the fish are the hardiest specimen in the tank. If you take to much time, you may lose a ton of beneficial micro-organism’s in your live rock, sand bed, and filter.
Water - Like you said, remove as much water as possible prior to disturbing ANYTHING. You may only need about 3/4 of your water as you will do a 20% water change when you set it back up.
Rock - Carefully remove rock. But your larger pieces (especially pieces that were embedded in the sand on the bottom of your Styrofoam containers. Soak wet newpaper w/ existing tank water and lay it over top of the rock. If you need these containers stop by AquaWorld on 65 - Ming will help you out.
Sand - CAREFULLY scoop your sand out with a dust pan. Try and keep the sand layered as it was in the tank. Put the sand in styrofoam containers. Put some of your old tank water in these containers b/c when you put the sand back into the tank at the new place - you can draining that mucky water out and it will help your tank from getting nasty on startup.
Filters - Now is NOT the time to clean your protein skimmer. It takes a while for them to “break-in” and you need it working right away. Use a micron filter pad at first in your filter to help clear things up fast. Also change your carbon on startup then again in 48 hours. Also do the same with any phosphate removers you may be using.
Follow-up - for the next 2 weeks or soI would do 5-10% water changes every 3-4 days dependent on how things are doing. Make sure your skimmer is doing its job. Don’t fry the tank with your lights for the first week. Let everything relax and only run 75-80% light cycle for those days - if you are running metal halides, pc’s ect…
All-in-all just think about what your doing. Remember everything is alive and try to keep it that way. Preserve every part of the tanks biological as you can. Good luck shawn… and shaggy?
BTW - I got 2 brand new hamilton technology metal halides 20K that would be sick on your tank. CHEAP Like sick CHEAP. Hit me up on here, I got a few filters and stuff too.
