Transferring fish

[enervate7]

Hello everybody,

I'm currently purchased a 54 gallon corner aquarium (bow-front). I want to transfer my fish I currently have in my old tank to the 54gallon. I heard that you must cycle the water for the new aquarium or you can put water from the old aquarium to provide the fish with bacteria. I'm not sure what is the best solution in transferring fish. Also I'm looking into buying a cpr hob refugium from Dr. foster site( is it worth buying?)


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[PoppaRyno]

I would setup the tank this way. But this is just me. Take as much water as you can from the established tank. Add to new tank. Fill tank rest of way. Add 1 cap full of prime. Start filter. Check levels in a few hours. Hopefully youll getvenough beneficial bacteria from the established water to significantly reduce cycle time. Established plants, wood, filter media can all be added to help reduce cycling time. How much faster it makes it is still a guessing game. Depends on too many variables, I.E... new or established substrate, tap or ro water, if tap whats the tap like in your city, or well or blah blah blah. But stsrting with established tank water helps cut down a lot of time on cycling, but still must be monitored before adding fish in my opinion. Hope this helps a little. Happy tanking!

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[PoppaRyno]

Oh and i say 1 cap of prime because 1 cap does 50 gals.

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[Sniperhank]

One suggestion I always give is to get new sand in the tank. Old sand is a trap for old food and poop. No reason to bring that over. Even rinsing the rock before moving it over in old tank water could be a good idea.
There is almost no beneficial bacteria in the water column. It is in the rock and sand. If you are moving the rock over you will not have to re-cycle your tank.
Just use lots of 5 gallon buckets so you can rinse off the rock and hold livestock while you put the rock, sand, and new saltwater into the new tank. Once everything has settled you can move the livestock in, though depending on how sensitive they are, like inverts as example, you may want to drip acclimate them to the new water.
When it comes to the HOB refugium, for a tank that size I don't think it would do very much. If that is the route you want to go, I would look into a HOB overflow and put a refugium under the tank. Bigger is better and can export more nutrients.

 

[Reefing Madness]

Water does not carry the necessary bacteria to cycle anyones tank. Its the Live Rock that carries the majority of the bacteria.
Remove the sand from your old tank, rinse it really really well, until the water runs clear through it. You can reuse it this way, it won't harm anything in your new tank. Put the sand in, fill the tank most of the way with SW. Grab the rock out of your old tank, let the system run for 3-4 days, this will cycle the tank quickly. Providing you had enough Live Rock in the old tank. Leave water circulating in the old tank for the fish, they will be ok in there for a few days without anything.
Other way to do it is, emtpy the tank water into your bathtub, before stirring up the tank or removing anything. Put a heater in there and a powerhead.
Remove the sand, rinse well. Set up new tank, fill 2/3rds water, add live rock, fill the rest of the way. Add skimmer a heater and powerheads, let run for a few days, then your all set.
If you do not do one of the above, your new tank will go through a cycle, and this you do not want. If it does, and you add fish, you will be chasing your tail with water changes, trying to keep the ammonia at 0.

 

[PoppaRyno]

Lol. I thought it was abt freshwater. Disregsrd me

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[enervate7]

Okay, sounds good I was probably going to purchase new sand or crush corals for the new tank. I only have one filter at this time which is running on the old tank. Would it be okay if I transfer portions of the old tank's live rock during the course of several days ? I was thinking of using a power head to circulate new tank .unfortunately My budget can't cover for a new filter( fluval canister)


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[Sniperhank]

Don't do crushed coral substrate. Extra food and poop gets stuck in there and can be a pain.
In terms of your canister and powerheads, just move them over from the old tank. There shouldn't be any issues with that.

 

[Reefing Madness]

Your going to need the Live Rock to seed the new tank, and keep it from cycling. If you can't get it all in there at one time, for a few days, then transfer what you can at one time. then make sure the rest goes in the day the fish do.

 

[enervate7]

Okay I manage to clean some of the sand with rdo/di water I'm processing saltwater atm. I already transfer portions of the live rocks in the new tank and left the other in the old tank with live stock. Once my sw is process I will run a few test and put it in and transfer the fish one by one. For the overflow box how to I go about installing a refugium? I don't really understand the refugium set up or how it cleans the aquarium mechanically? How do I go about setting a overflow and refugium to the tank? Thank you all for you help! I will post pictures once complete.


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[Reefing Madness]

This should help, as far as the sump goes.
What is a sump? | Melev's Reef

A fuge is where you put the macro algae or plants and such. The macro and plants eat the excess nutrients out of the water column, or, polish the water for you, with the help of a skimmer.
You can also run a ATS, Alage Turf Scrubber, of which, if it was big enough, you would not need a skimmer.

Marine Depot Blog: How to Install an Aquarium Overflow Box

How to Prime a HOB overflow | Melev's Reef

 

[Sniperhank]

An ATS is a great form of filtration, I just made one myself. That said, it isn't a replacement for a skimmer but can easily replace a refugium and easily out competes it IMO.

 

[enervate7]

Thank you guys! The tank was running great and the fish where thriving however during the course of a few days one fish died. A week latter I check the water parameters and ran tests,all came out fine. I decided to purchase a yellow tang and the following morning my tank was wiped out! I knew there was a huge risk for doing this switch. I didn't expect such a big wipe out. Literary every fish and invertebrate gone! It occurred to me that I have little red worms wondering around on the sand bed. I continue to leave my tank running while I process new sw for the aquarium. The following day I have an infestation of these red little pests! These suckers grew in size and they are spread out like colonies throughout the sand bed. I do not know what to do or how to even eliminate them. Is there any method of how to get rid of them? They are growing in girth and manage to move in the live rocks. Can someone please help! Sorry for the grammatical errors!


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[enervate7]

I also posted photos of the tank. I forget to mention my fluval sea protein skimer ps1( GARBAGE) is no longer working. I just purchased a reef-octopus hob 1000-ph Classic. I'm waiting for it to arrive in mail. Any tips on how to properly utilize this skimmer thank you guys!


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[Sniperhank]

From the looks of it, there isn't near enough rock in the tank. When switching things over and then adding a yellow tang, which shouldn't be in a tank under 6 ft long, you overwhelmed the beneficial bacteria in the tank and basically mini cycled the tank and killed off the livestock.

 

[enervate7]

Yea, figured that was the issue. I get some more live-rock. How do I eliminate the infestation of this red worms?


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[Sniperhank]

Those red worms are either bristle worms or peanut worms. Do they have 'spikes' or 'feelers' along the side and look like a centipede?

 

[PB_Smith]

are you sure about the water parameters?

I seriously doubt that adding one fish would tip the balance to the point of everything dying overnight. If so then the water quality was already pretty bad and you should have noticed by the fish's behavior.
It's very unlikely that was the cause.
If the water parameters were good than I would consider some type of contamination as the culprit.

But in my opinion what happened is that for some reason you didn't get accurate test results and your fish died due to high nitrite levels.
If roughly a week + had passed since the transfer and you did move some bacteria over, but probably not enough if you rinsed the sand, (which should have been done in tank water to preserve the bacteria, not fresh water), you probably encountered a mini cycle and the timing is just right for elevated nitrite levels.

but even then it is very unusual that everything would die overnight unless levels were rather high, and the fish should have been acting ill before you purchased the tang if that was the case.

You should take a water sample to the lfs for testing.

 

[enervate7]

Yea the yellow tang was acting differently and suddey died. I believe the local lfs (Petco) sold me a sick fish or the nitrates levels where too high. Whatever the problem was, all the fish and invertebrates were wiped out. When I transferred the aquarium I rinse the old sand bed and live rocks with rdo/di. I'd purchased a 20lb bag of live sand. I will run tests after I get out of work. But the problem I'm having is these red worms. I posted several pictures on how they might look. When my fish where wiped, these worms were feeding ?.


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[Sniperhank]

Those are bristle worms. They are beneficial members of your clean up crew. If they get large, they are an easy sign of overfeeding.
Either way, this is a good time to double check the parameters, do a large water change, and SLOWLY work towards rebuilding the population in your tank by doing research on the fish to go in there. The yellow tang has no business in a tank of this size and would have lead to issues in no time.