The BIG fish migration - A slow unfolding documentary of moving 14 tanks.

OK The big move has started and slowly I'm building up to a few days of moving tanks and fish. Most of it will not cause any headaces but there might be some hickups along the way.

Lets start at the beginning. Here is a list of tanks that will be moved.
1. 4ft with 3ft sump.
10 Boesimani Rainbows
4 Red Tail Rainbows
5 Kutubu Rainbows
2 Blue rock gobies
1 Sumatran red gob
2 SAE's
About 15 Panda cories
1 Pepperd corie
2 Green Cories
1 Horseface loach
About 5 Otto's
Unknown amount of Kuli loaches
3 Klown loaches
3 Polkadot loaches
2 Zebra loaches

2. 3ft tank with internal and hob filters.
1 Panaque
2 Cocketoides
1 Macmastri
4 Panda cories
2 Scunk cories
1 Adolfoi corie
6 Triliniata cories
2 Zebra loaches
1 Whiptail catfish

3. 1ft with hob filter.
3 Psuedomugil Gertrudia
1 Otto
Unknown amount of Blue Jelly shrimp

4. 30cm cube with hob filter.
6 Psuedomugil Signifer (2 adult and 4 fry)
1 Psuedomugil Paskai
1 Otto
Unknown amount of Red Cherrie shrimp

5. 670x200x100 tank with internal filter.
Some Red Cherrie shrimp

6. 400x300x100 tank with internal filter.
1 Hara jardoni catfish
2 Strawberry rasboras
1 Emerald rasbora

7. 1ft with spong filter.
7 male endlers

8. 1ft with spong filter.
10 female endlers

9. 2ft tank with 2 spong filters
2 Ansistrus
6 Peppered cories
2 female endlers
About 30 fry
Unknown amount of Red Cherry shrimp

10. 2ft moss tank with 100l sump.
2 female endlers
5 fry
Unknown amount of Tainbow shrimp

11. 1.5ft tank with hob filter
1 gemale guppy
Unknown amount of fry.

12. 1ft tank with spong filter.
About 30 male endlers

13. 1ft tank with spong filter.
About 30 female endlers

14. 1ft tank with spong filter.
Unknown amount of Blue Carbon Rilli shrimp

Biggest mission of all is the 4 and 3 ft tanks as they need to be completely drained and substrate removed. I'm not taking chances on this as I need the tanks up and running again the same day.

Tanks 11 and 12 will be empty before the move as the fish in tanks 12 and 13 will go to the lfs tomorrow. The fry in tank 11 will temporary go into tank 13 for the move. Once moved the shrimp in tank 14 will be split between tanks 11 and 12.

Now here follows my planning. All the tanks smaller, and including the 2ft tanks, will be drained to have a water level of about 5cm. All these tanks are on individual pieces of plywood. They will then be cling wrapped to hold everything inside. All spongs filters will be placed in buckets with some of the drained water to preserve bacteria. Not all tanks will be moved at the same time but over a period of about 2 weeks. Furniture will also be moved during this time so days will be alternated between the 2 so that I can give all my atention to the fishes when they get moved.

The distance we move is only 4km which helps a lot. I aim to be able to drain, transport and refil 3 tanks at a time in nothing more than 1 hour. At the new place I will already have containers with aged and treated water as well as botteled bacteria ready. I don't need to have the water heated as non of these tanks have any heaters in them at the moment.

For the 4 and 3ft tanks I have set a whole day aside, each. All fishes will be removed from tank and placed in 2 polestyrene containers fitted with portable air pumps. To prevent waste, the fishes will not get any food for 2 days before move. All wood will be removed and clingwrapped as there is moss and anubias attatched to them. Plants removed and placed in buckets with drained water. PFS removed in 1 container and pottingsoil mix in another. Ceramic rings from sump goes in bucket with draines water and air pump. Load stand, tank, sump, fishes, plants and substrate. Drive like a maniac to point B.
Bath tub filled with treated water to dump wood in ready that side. Still in 2 minds about using the other bath to put the fishes in as the next part will take some time. Naturally the baths will be properly cleaned and bleached beforehand. Sump will be cleaned first and ceramic ring returned with some bottled bacteria added. Water will be sirculated through the sump to keep the good stuff going. I will then clean and boil the pfs to get rid of the malatian trumpet snail that my overfed loaches don't eat. Tank will be cleaned and new pipes fitted to sump. Do a complete rescape of tank. Fill up with treated water and start sirculation from sump. Will run a diy water pollisher to get rid of cloady water. As soon as tank is clear fish will go back in.

Next day repeat above but with 3ft. This one should go faster as there is way less plants and fish involved.

If all goes according to what is writtend here, on digital paper, I should be fine. Already working on plan B for the smaller tanks if anything goes wrong with the first trip.

If there is anybody that is still reading up to this point and who has had done anything similar. Please share your knowledge and experiances here. This is a first for me and any advice will surely be apreciated.

Photo's will follow as this unfolds.


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@Pierré Schoonraad ... sounds like you have everything well planed

I just scared to move tanks with any water inside... last time i did my 2f sprung a leak but i guess i was to blame for not having wood underneath

I dont envy you... Wish you all the best and that everything goes smoothly

 

And... sorry if its a silly reminder... some of those fish are escape artists out of buckets.....

 

It seems you have everything well thought out.
Good luck with the move, and hope everything works out as you planned.

 

Thanks @MariaS and @Pezulu. Yes this is what happens when you lie awake at 3 am stressing about moving the tanks. You learn from your wife's habbit and start planning, and plan again for what if?

All the buckets have tight fitting lids so they should stay inside. I just hate catching fish. I just don't have the heart in chacing them around the tank with nets all over the place.

That is also the main reason why I will be moving the smaller tanks with the fish inside. Regarding the 2 2ft tanks. The one is my moss tank which have been growing for 2 years now and it is standing on a wooden box, for the draining to the sump, so it should be stable. The other 2ft has a lot of rocks in it which makes it quite heavy. These rocks will be removed before it gets moved. If there is a problem on this tank the fish can be moved temporaraly to one of the empty breeding tanks.

All I'm hoping for is the get all tanks there in one piece and not have any losses. Not too much to ask?

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Sheesh, that's a lot of work. Agree with @MariaS that you shouldn't even contemplate moving a tank with water or rocks inside. Been there, done that, got the T-shirt. Not a good idea. If it were me, I'd actually consider buying a new tank or two, and setting them up first, then moving the livestock into the already running tank. Then, when you are done, you have a spare tank for eventualities, or you could sell the old one.

While I don't envy you the work to move, I'm willing to bet I'll change my tune once your fishroom is up and running. So good luck, and post pics as you go.

 

Thanks @dorff all should go well with the tanks, I hope. Only real concern is the 1 2ft with rocks in. All other tanks are bare bottom or with minimum decor. If anything happens to this tank there will be spare tanks waiting to move to.

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Thanks @Reedfish

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Update. First tanks have been moved. Worked 99% according to my planning. Luckely for me it was only a multiplug that malfunctioned so wirering is not done.
Moved fish from tanks 12 and 13 to lfs. Transfered fry in 14 to empty tank 13. Completely drained tanks 12 and 14. In hindsight I might have been too optimistic about doing everything in a hour but seeing that it was only me, myself and I who did the moving it didn't go bad.

Tanks 11 and 13 was first drained with 5cm of water in. All hardware removed. Spong filters placed in bucket with tank water. Tanks wrapped in cling wrap and moved into the house.
Tank 9 was next in line. The heaviest of the lot as I was only removing water from this tank. I placed balls of plastic bags between the glas and hardscape to prevent it from moving and bumping the glas, did not use enough as hardscape moved and a lot of drifting plants but no damage. Tank was wrapped in cling wrap and placed in the loading line. Drained the sump, 100l meat tub, placed all the media in a bucket with tank water.
Finally I could get to the last tank on the stand. Nr 10. Drained water to 5cm level. Removed all the rocks and wraped tank in cling wrap.
All these tanks were on the same stand made out of reused crates. This had to be taken appart so it can fit through doors and also light enough for me to carry. After all of this I started loading the non fish items, empty tanks and stand. Because of the heat I worked quite fast in loading and securing the tanks with fish on the bakkie.



Driving to point B I tried to drive as fast but as safe with the load. With 2 stands already in the fish room I could start offloading the tanks first and the the rest. Every tank that came in had a hole punshed in the cling wrap to get rid of any heat buld up.

Reasembled stand and started on sorting the tanks. Started with tank 9, as he goes on the top of the stand. Water very dirty after filling but noticed fish and shrimp swimming around so I was happy. Substrate was churned up with the movement so not a good idee to have capped substrate and water in a tank when moving it. Next was 10 with his sump. Before I forget I added bacteria to all these tanks to make sure all is well. No problems with this tank except for the hardscape that moved around in transit.
I then filled tank 14 whiles sorting out the scape in 10. Tank 13 was filled up and all well. Connected air pump and spong filters and started running them when the multiplug desided to to quit. Luckely I had some spare adaptors there and I was able to sort the power out. Now the plan was to move the shrimp from 11 to 14. Unfortunatelly this tank also had substrate in it and the water looked like mud. Tried catshing srimp by moving the net around the tank with no good resolts. Plan B. I syphoned some of the water out into a bucket. Some shrimp came through with the water. This I poured out of the bucket into the net. All shrimp from bucket safely into 14. The 1/3 full tanks water went the same way and all shrimp, I believe, relocated as planned.
I had 2 extra 1ft tanks, for the breading rack, and 2 spare seeded spongs filters which I then filled up and connected to the air pump.

Things I've learned today.
1. Don't move a tank with water and substrate. You will have muddy water.
2. If you move a tank with hardscape in it rather put in more 'supports' than what you think you need.

Tanks still dirty but fish needs to settle first. Will do another wc on these tanks by tomorrow to make sure everything is fine. Not bad for one days work. In the end I was busy from about 11 and finished just before 7.

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@Pierré Schoonraad . lots of work but sounds as mostly went well so far. Well done

 

Good luck with the rest of the move.
You seem to have everything well in hand.

 

Thanks @MariaS and @Pezulu .

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WAIT !!!!!! if do wall insulation first 25 - 50mm Styrofoam sheets from builders, just slide them behind the tanks makes a huge difference in winters esp outside facing walls.

 

Too late @f-fish . This room shouldn't get that cold during winter. If there is a big decrease in temp I plant to heat the room.

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Eish - sorry. Well see how it goes, but I promise you a bit of foam makes all the difference on the power bill. Those outside windows and wall suck all heat out the room and will leave you running your heater neat 24x7 .. esp if you aiming for 24 degrees in the room. Big wins in insulation - windows - remove the potability of a draft.


I need natural light into the room - or it would be a cave and I would loose all sense of day and night. So got some thick clear plastic, removed the foam that was covering the window and double taped it to the wall. No more breeze and it does give me a bit of protection for quick temp shifts. Cleaning is a problem and condensation can also be.

Later Ferdie

 

I will defnitly keep the insulation in mind when winter creaps up on us. I work next to Isowall so if I need it I can get some very fast. The tanks on the left hand stand, against outer wall, is not in their final position and I will make sure that I leave enough space for insulation against the wall.

For humidity reasons I will always have one of the small windows opened. There will be blinds on the windows as there is afternoon sun comming in. As looks in this room is not much of a concern, even from outside, I will use 50mm polistyrene during winter to prevent heat loss through the window glass.

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Some set back. Got to the new place at about 11 this morning. Sponge over filter on tank 14 totaly clogged up and filter barely working. Shrimp and fish gasping for air. Unfortunately a lot of dead red cherries. Scooped the out. No fish casualties though. Doing water change now the clear things up some more. All other tanks doing fine.

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Ouch.
Not a nice experience ever, but it is part of the learning curve.

 

Shure is. Luckely all fish are ok in this tank. And cherries do breed very fast.

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