About to move to new town, need advice please

[belveder69]

G'day all. I'm about to move to a new town which is about 6 hours away and my tanks are coming with me.

Have got a furniture removalist handling the tanks but I'm worried about the fish and water.

I don't have anything super delicate like discus which makes it eassier.

I figured i would bag the fish from each tank in their separate bags and then put in a tub for each tank. Any input on this idea is appreciated.

The problem is, I want to take water from from each tank so I can set each tank up almost straight away the the temp has settled on arrival. My issue is I don't know how much water to take
I'm guessing maybe 50% but thats a lot of tubs / containers.

Any advice appreciated please.

 

[Andy Sager]

G'day all. I'm about to move to a new town which is about 6 hours away and my tanks are coming with me.

Have got a furniture removalist handling the tanks but I'm worried about the fish and water.

I don't have anything super delicate like discus which makes it eassier.

I figured i would bag the fish from each tank in their separate bags and then put in a tub for each tank. Any input on this idea is appreciated.

The problem is, I want to take water from from each tank so I can set each tank up almost straight away the the temp has settled on arrival. My issue is I don't know how much water to take
I'm guessing maybe 50% but thats a lot of tubs / containers.

Any advice appreciated please.

I actually moved fish from NJ to Florida in the back of our car so I have a little experience with this. The first suggestion is if you can, get water from your new place tested to see how or if it is different the parameters are from what you use now. The closer to your water parameters it is, the easier it will be on you and your fish. You want Ph, GH, KH, ammonia and nitrate readings to compare.
Unless you are using breather bags, you need oxygen in a closed bag so if you have a store close to you, ask if you can bring in your fish in bags for them to oxygenate the bags. Fish actually need more oxygen than water in the bag so if they are oxygenating the bags, they may want to reduce you water level in the bags. If you do not have a local store that will do that for you, bait and tackle shops sell a battery operated air pump for live bait. Depending on how many containers you are going to have, get one or two of these pumps and use a gang valve to place airstones in the bags and leave the bags open so that there is the exchange of gases. For this you'll want to have some extra water in the bags so that the fish don't get gas bubbles.
IF your new water is close to your current water's parameters, you can fill up the tanks when you get settled and just acclimate your fish for temperature before adding them into the tank(s). Treat it like a standard water change you would do at your current home. If you need to do more than 40%-50% new water, I suggest you do it over a couple of days instead of all that new water at once.
IF your new water is not close to your old water's parameters, you need to treat the situation as a large scale water change and acclimate the fish slowly to the new water. This is best done by bringing enough water from your old place so that the fish can swim around in the tank(s) when they get reset up. Daily you can add 10%-15% of volume of new water and wait 24 hours for the fish to get used to the new water before adding more water. Every 24 hours add that 10%-15% new water until the tank is full. When you have a drastic difference in water parameters, time is your best friend. Don't be in a rush to hurry the fill up. The fish need time to adjust to new water parameters.
Depending on which scenario you end up doing, you may not be able to use a HOB filter immediately so you'll want to either take the filter material out of the filter and place it in a container of water with an airstone running in it or set the filter up on a tub with water and just let it flow as normal so that your nitrifying microbes get the oxygen they need to stay alive. If you are using an inside the tank filter ( i.e. sponge filter internal filter), you may need to adjust the outflow tube so that there is enough water movement through them until the tank is fully filled with water. As long as the filter material remains wet during the transfer from one house to the other, 6 hours should not do much if any damage to the microbes.

Hope this helps.

 

[belveder69]

I actually moved fish from NJ to Florida in the back of our car so I have a little experience with this. The first suggestion is if you can, get water from your new place tested to see how or if it is different the parameters are from what you use now. The closer to your water parameters it is, the easier it will be on you and your fish. You want Ph, GH, KH, ammonia and nitrate readings to compare.
Unless you are using breather bags, you need oxygen in a closed bag so if you have a store close to you, ask if you can bring in your fish in bags for them to oxygenate the bags. Fish actually need more oxygen than water in the bag so if they are oxygenating the bags, they may want to reduce you water level in the bags. If you do not have a local store that will do that for you, bait and tackle shops sell a battery operated air pump for live bait. Depending on how many containers you are going to have, get one or two of these pumps and use a gang valve to place airstones in the bags and leave the bags open so that there is the exchange of gases. For this you'll want to have some extra water in the bags so that the fish don't get gas bubbles.
IF your new water is close to your current water's parameters, you can fill up the tanks when you get settled and just acclimate your fish for temperature before adding them into the tank(s). Treat it like a standard water change you would do at your current home. If you need to do more than 40%-50% new water, I suggest you do it over a couple of days instead of all that new water at once.
IF your new water is not close to your old water's parameters, you need to treat the situation as a large scale water change and acclimate the fish slowly to the new water. This is best done by bringing enough water from your old place so that the fish can swim around in the tank(s) when they get reset up. Daily you can add 10%-15% of volume of new water and wait 24 hours for the fish to get used to the new water before adding more water. Every 24 hours add that 10%-15% new water until the tank is full. When you have a drastic difference in water parameters, time is your best friend. Don't be in a rush to hurry the fill up. The fish need time to adjust to new water parameters.
Depending on which scenario you end up doing, you may not be able to use a HOB filter immediately so you'll want to either take the filter material out of the filter and place it in a container of water with an airstone running in it or set the filter up on a tub with water and just let it flow as normal so that your nitrifying microbes get the oxygen they need to stay alive. If you are using an inside the tank filter ( i.e. sponge filter internal filter), you may need to adjust the outflow tube so that there is enough water movement through them until the tank is fully filled with water. As long as the filter material remains wet during the transfer from one house to the other, 6 hours should not do much if any damage to the microbes.

Hope this helps.

Thanks, that was very helpful. I have oxygen bottles at home for myself when needed so that makes thiings easier lol.

 

[Aiken Drum]

Theres also this article written for our site that might prove useful.

Moving Your Fresh Water Aquarium – Aquarium Advice

 

[Andy Sager]

Thanks, that was very helpful. I have oxygen bottles at home for myself when needed so that makes thiings easier lol.