Annadvn

I was bought a second hand 75g reef drilled tank for christmas so i can upgrade my 24g nano tank.

I know i am going to need more sand and live rock but what is the best way of moving everything over?

So far in the nano tank i have various mushrooms, ricordia, anthelia, xenia (very tiny right now just appeared from the live rock a week or two ago) and yellow star polyps. And for livestock i have various hermit crabs and snails and a watchman goby.

Can i buy some live sand and transfer everything from the nano cube over? I know i will need to get more live rock but i plan to work with what i have for now and buy a couple of pieces every time i go near a salt fish shop.

I also need to get a bigger protein skimmer any recommended for being quiet (the tank is in the master bedroom).

I'm going to make this a work in progress and slowly add more live rock, fish to it etc...

Thanks for help in advance
Anna

au01st

First thing I would do is get it in place and filled with water. Get the S.G. right, then worry about moving stuff.

How long has your current tank been set up? How many lbs of live sand/rock do you have now? I would buy "dead" sand and seed it with your live sand. I have about 80lbs of LR in my 75 tank, and wish I had a little more (found a way to fix that though) so make sure you get enough.

Anyways, once the temp and S.G. are good on your tank, I would add the new sand, then wait a day or two for it to clear. You'll need to cycle this tank before you add any livestock, so add your new live rock and let it cycle. When the cycle finishes, add the old pieces of live rock, aquascape, then add your old live sand. Then move all your corals over.

As for the skimmer, I have a Coralife Super Skimmer 125, and it's really quiet. I'm going to attempt the "mesh mod" tonight when I get home from work and see if it gets louder from that. I found the Coralife skimmer for $118 online + s/h.

Annadvn

Thanks for replying Au01st.

So there is not a way to avoid cycling then with all new sand and rock? I was kind of hoping i could do like i would in freshwater and add cycled gravel (or in this case sand and live rock) and filter material (not that i have a mechanical filter).

But in that case i will have to put the upgrade on hold and save the money for the live rock.

I will look into the protein skimmer and see if i can get one.

Thanks

Anna

Rbacchiega

There are ways to go about just transferring fish, but it's always at a risk. Look for a product called Stability by Seachem. I was able to move things from a 125 gallon into my 8foot tank (just under 400 gallons) after filling it the day before. I followed the suggested dosing and didn't lose a single fish or coral. Not even the finiky fish like my mandarin dragonets...