|
|
|
|
|
My StuffCurrent articles in progressA mated pair of Cleaner Shrimp. Over heated Zoa's during shipping Water Quality for the salt aquarium Reef Links
|
The big move. Due to the price of gas and working 35 miles from my home I have run into the need to move a little to where I do a lot of my work. Moving from Vero Beach to Port Saint Lucie Florida, was a move I was not looking forward to making because of my love for Vero Beach but, it was absolutely necessary. I thought I would take a few photos and post a little bit about how I moved the 55 gallon tank. I knew I would need quite a few containers of different sizes to haul the water and the inhabitants, most of which I already had on hand. A lot of the live rock in my tank has soft corals growing on them and need to be transported so each rock is separate as not to do harm to the corals by rocks being bumped together during the ride. So, I used deep Rubbermaid containers that had a large base to them so things could be spread out in the bottom a bit. Any of the base rock that had no corals on them went into 5 gallon buckets. All the water went into 6 gallon liquid totes. I used the pump and return line to pump the water into the totes. I basically looked at the move as a ten gallon water change. I knew I would be getting rid of at least 2 1/2 gallons of water, so I had my RO/DI unit setup at the new house the day before and had run off 12 gallons of water for the tank. I mixed the salt with the water and let a pump run in it all night. My salt stays at 1.025 and I always weigh out my salt with a 5 pound postal scale. 650 grams per 5 gallons of water. I use Instant Ocean salt and have since starting in saltwater 25 years ago. Below is a shot of the sump on this tank. It is a 55 gallon wet/dry which has been and is still being converted to a totally wet system. The great thing about wet/dry systems which have bio balls is the rapid growth of aerobic bacteria which helps speed the start of the tanks cycle. I have been removing the bio balls from this system and replacing them with live rock rubble. The protein skimmer on the tank is a Coralife 65 super skimmer. I found this skimmer to be quite adequate for the 55 as long as it is cleaned and maintained on a periodic basis. You can see there is quite a bit of skimmate in the collection cup after 3 days of operation. Quite a few people have had a problem with this skimmer expelling micro bubbles into the water column and I did as well. I ran a hose from the skimmer output pipe to the compartment which houses the live rock rubble. The bubbles dissipate in this area of the sump. This is not a standard sump by any means but. it is adequate for this tank as all it contains is softies and fish
Every three months I empty the rock rubble of the sump into a bucket of water that I have removed from the tank during a water change and give these guys a rinse. I also rinse out any debris (particulates) that have collected on the sump bottom.
Here's a few shots of the tank before the move.
Right side.
Middle
Left side.
The first thing I did was to withdraw 2 1/2 gallons of clear tank water into a 5 gallon bucket. I used the 2 1/2 gallons of tank water to rinse off every rock before it went into any of the buckets or Rubbermaid containers. I dipped each rock and gave it a bit of a shake as to knock off any of the detritus matter which would cloud up the water they would travel in. I hung the protein skimmer on the side of one of the Rubbermaids and cleaned it's collection cup.
My girlfriend Lisa gave me hand with removing the live rock from the tank and placing it in the Rubbermaid's. When we got the rock all settled in the bottoms of the Rubbermaids we pumped clear tank water in to cover them up.
Once all the rock had been removed from the tank, the water was drained into 6 gallon liquid totes. I used the pump from the sump and the tanks return line to do most of the work in filling the 6 gallon totes; the rest of the water, down to the substrate was removed by siphon.
Al of the fish where place into their own bucket of water and an air stone was added to keep the water oxygenated.
Once the fish where safely removed, I siphoned the water down to the substrate. Siphoning the water down to the substrate was the only way to get the tank light enough to carry. Siphoning is not really had to do and there is a trick! Put your thumb in your mouth and pull water up as far as you can into the hose and let any air in the hose get removed. Once you have the hose full of water, put your thumb over the end and place the hose in your bucket. If you are lower than the water's level the siphon will start automatically by gravity. Hey MAN! Don't drink the water! :) I did nothing to the substrate. The water level was lowered to about 1/2 inch above and that's how it rode.
I took the overflow box off the back of the tank and put it in the sump and got the truck all loaded up.
The 55 was moved in and set back up. I let my girlfriend scape it the way she wanted and I think she did a really good job!
Thanks for looking!
|
|
|
