Adding Live Sand..?

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Big Tex

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Jun 1, 2013
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so i have a tank thats been up a few months and has a healthy stock and is very stable, i want to upgrade to a larger tank and keep everything from the smaller one along with adding another 20lb bag of arragalive to keep the same depth sand bed from the first tank, is this safe..? what will happen..?
 
I'd wait until the upgrade, move over the rock, add all the sand, and fill it up.

im asking because i have the other tank right now lol and i just want to dump the new sand in, with the old, get my rocks setup the way i like em, and start filling with the old water then about 5gal or so of new water with the same filters and let it clear, then add fish, how long can they survive in a bucket with a bubbler..?
 
im asking because i have the other tank right now lol and i just want to dump the new sand in, with the old, get my rocks setup the way i like em, and start filling with the old water then about 5gal or so of new water with the same filters and let it clear, then add fish, how long can they survive in a bucket with a bubbler..?

Put the rocks in first. That way they are supported by sand.

Why use old water? Just fill it up with new, clean water and not have to worry about having essential elements depleted.

Use the filters on the bucket with your fish. Long as there is oxygen from water movement and heat you only need to worry about ammonia levels. The filtration will help with that, but is still check it daily for as long as they are in the bucket.
 
so i have a tank thats been up a few months and has a healthy stock and is very stable, i want to upgrade to a larger tank and keep everything from the smaller one along with adding another 20lb bag of arragalive to keep the same depth sand bed from the first tank, is this safe..? what will happen..?
what size tank do you have now? And what do you want to upgrade to? How much old rock and are you adding any new rock?? It all makes a big diff?
 
Put the rocks in first. That way they are supported by sand. Why use old water? Just fill it up with new, clean water and not have to worry about having essential elements depleted. Use the filters on the bucket with your fish. Long as there is oxygen from water movement and heat you only need to worry about ammonia levels. The filtration will help with that, but is still check it daily for as long as they are in the bucket.
not good switching all your water at once. It's like doing a 100% water change. New parameters, not good idea
 
A fresh mix will be the same as the old plus some nitrates in a fowlr system or a reef would be missing some essential elements. If it is a concern drip acclimation would solve this into the holding bucket.
 
Do not use the sand from your old tank in your new tank. The organisms in the sand will die and foul your water. If you are going to fish less cycle the tank that's ok but do not move everything over if you reuse sand. I made that mistake and lost a fortune in fish and coral.
 
You can also rinse the sand to get rid of some of the die off if you use the old sand.

I did that and it didn't help. All the micro organisms and stuff in the sand is near impossible to remove. Like I said before, either do a fish less cycle with the used sand or if you want to put your livestock in right away just buy new sand.
 
I did that and it didn't help. All the micro organisms and stuff in the sand is near impossible to remove. Like I said before, either do a fish less cycle with the used sand or if you want to put your livestock in right away just buy new sand.

How is this so? Ill literally be just swapping tanks, same water, same rocks, same filter and same stock, ill just be adding about 10g of new water like a water change.
 
How long has your tank been just up for tex. just a few months, right. If I'm correct then I don't think there'd be a problem. Just up an eye on your lvls and do water changes if needed.
 
How long has your tank been just up for tex. just a few months, right. If I'm correct then I don't think there'd be a problem. Just up an eye on your lvls and do water changes if needed.

Yeah a few months, I just picked up an oceanic reef systems 46g bow front and I need to move all my stuff from the 36g over
 
I don't think your sand has a bunch of junk built up in it yet. May see higher then normal nitrates but that's nothing a few decent water changes can't fix
 
I don't think your sand has a bunch of junk built up in it yet. May see higher then normal nitrates but that's nothing a few decent water changes can't fix

well ill pretty much be doing a big water change, adding around 10g of new saltwater to the tank after swapping it all into the new one.
 
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