Help With 120G Tank Transfer

[Bikinisalt]

This is what I am planning to do this weekend. I have a 120G tank I want to break up with about 160lbs of LR, a few corals, 2" LS, large wet/dry and about 15 fish total.

Unfortunately I had a bad learning experience with the fish, most are large angels and I learned the hard way and they ate most of the corals and that is why I want to transfer them to other tanks. The angels are fat, I guess that's a good thing, a few corals are still living, but most of the corals are gone or about to die...

My transfer will be to a 135G tank and another 120G tank. I am a little confused in how to go about this and try to prevent any casualties. My plans were to buy some new LS from the LFS, about 80lbs for each tank and put about 140lbs of LR in the 120G(which I plan to dedicate for corals and hopefully make it a nice reef tank) with a refugium/sump and skimmer and the balance of the LR in the new 135G with the old wet/dry and skimmer.

OR

Should I set up the other tanks, buy the LS, put it in let them run a few days and take some rock out a little at a time over a period of about 2 weeks and then put the fish in. But the most important thing I am trying to do is save whatever little corals I have left.

Now the angels will be going to the 135G tank and the other fish like a few tangs, wrasses, crabs, a few starfish, anemones, etc in the 120G tank which I want to dedicate to just reef.

Is this something that might work? or should I attempt something else. I really don't would not want any losses. If I am doing something wrong, PLEASE LET ME KNOW. Any help will be much appreciated...

 

[Dj Orion]

If I had to try and split up 2 tanks like that, I would try not to disturb the main tank as much as possible. If you can start fresh on the second tank, and only move pieces of rock with corals on it, I think that would be the best move IMO. You can even save some of your original water and transfer that into the new tank when you do water changes. That way you may be able to kick start that tanks cycle in the process. You can try and prevent your 120 from recycling, and get a fresh start on the reef tank with new LR and LS. Does that help or make any sense? lol :scratchch

You are going to need to purchase some new LR and LS anyways, why not just start fresh on the reef tank?

 

[Bikinisalt]

You are going to need to purchase some new LR and LS anyways, why not just start fresh on the reef tank?

Thanks for the info and you are right I am going to have to buy more LR and LS, but what I am doing is tring to make two tanks out of one and not have 3 tanks. If I kepted all 3 tanks I will find my self in divorce court...

 

[Aqua Pro Builder]

If I were you I would put new sand in, 2 cups of old sand (top inch only), new water, 2 days later check the parameters. If no ammonia, it's safe to transfer live rocks over. When ammonia is high, the nitrifying bacteria in established rocks will die off causing a mini cycle. Continue to check the pars for couple more days to see if it goes good before any fish or coral.

As previous post say, try not to disturb the old tank until absolutely need to. However, unless you are careless and out of patient type of person(hmm...l think you said you have no patience before) transferring rocks slowly would be no problem in general. Anyway, since you are putting more rocks in, I do have live rocks that are fully cured as long as you transport them from my place to yours in water.

 

[Dj Orion]

lol, well, you can transfer the original 120g (future fish only) and keep it as much in tact as possible. I guess the key goal here is to avaoid having to recycle that tank with all the fish in it. If you remove too much rock and change things up, it will prob happen. It happened to me when I was attempting a similar project. Then I had to deal with a brown algae bloom.... sigh, you get the point.

 

[Davidl919]

Wow that's alot of work. Just a quick breeze through your post and I would suggest Moving as much of the live rock and sand with the angels/fish this way you have a smaller bioload and cycle on that tank because everything is established... The new tank should have all the new sand and rock and I would let it run for two weeks before you add some chromis to check your water and 2 weeks after that start Coral Shopping. If you would have posted earlier I could have made some time to help you out but one day before the weekend and I can't even find time for myself in that little time:happysad:. Good Luck with it though.

 

[Aqua Pro Builder]

I would not check water with chromis. Most of the time, testing the pars is enough to tell if the tank is ready for fish or corals.

Wow that's alot of work. Just a quick breeze through your post and I would suggest Moving as much of the live rock and sand with the angels/fish this way you have a smaller bioload and cycle on that tank because everything is established... The new tank should have all the new sand and rock and I would let it run for two weeks before you add some chromis to check your water and 2 weeks after that start Coral Shopping. If you would have posted earlier I could have made some time to help you out but one day before the weekend and I can't even find time for myself in that little time:happysad:. Good Luck with it though.

 

[Bikinisalt]

Wow that's alot of work. Just a quick breeze through your post and I would suggest Moving as much of the live rock and sand with the angels/fish this way you have a smaller bioload and cycle on that tank because everything is established... The new tank should have all the new sand and rock and I would let it run for two weeks before you add some chromis to check your water and 2 weeks after that start Coral Shopping. If you would have posted earlier I could have made some time to help you out but one day before the weekend and I can't even find time for myself in that little time:happysad:. Good Luck with it though.

But most of the live rock is going for the reef tank and the angels will be in a Fish only tank with maybe about 30 lbs of rock. Basically I am counting on the wet/dry that happens to be running for the Fish only tank...

 

[Davidl919]

So use the 30lbs of rock from your existing stock, this way your angels/the fowlr tank will not go through a full cycle.
My advice is based that you lost a majority of your corals and don't want to lose your angels so keeping the angels in familiar water parameters decreases the stress they may go through when moving them to a new tank, Since you don't have much coral, introducing new rock and sand to your reef tank won't be as big an impact as long as you wait the cycle through. The chromi suggestion is based on the fact that they are the least expensive reef safe fish and since it is a new tank, levels will shift from one week to the next until your tank establishes itself. No one wants to lose anything but if a loss is necessary why not chromis?... Hope this helps.

 

[Bikinisalt]

I do have 4 chromis in the existing tank. I was going to put them in the reef tank.

The angels which are a queen angel, french angel, koran angel, majestic angel, emperor angel, and a blue face are going in the FO tank...

 

[robnyc]

Angel Question about the tank

You mentioned you had 6 Angels in the tank. Everything I read says you can't have two in a tank. How were you able to do it? Eventually I'd like to upgrade to the 120G range does that make it doable?

 

[Bikinisalt]

You mentioned you had 6 Angels in the tank. Everything I read says you can't have two in a tank. How were you able to do it? Eventually I'd like to upgrade to the 120G range does that make it doable?

They don't bother each other. They are always eating. Maybe the corals they ate and destroyed kepted them busy, I don't know. Maybe I got lucky...