Moving House

[laurasmithuk]

i am due to move house in march and wanna take my fish with me.

how do i go about moving the tank etc?

im not moving far but have no idea how.

 

[Bloo]

How far is not far ?
How large is your tank ? and what are the inhabitants ?
How long do you think it will take you to empty, move and setup in the new home ?

 

[laurasmithuk]

the tank is 96 litres and has -

3 platties
1 adf
2 yamota shrimp
6 neons
and 1 adf

it is probably about a mile away only a five minute drive.

just not sure how to go about moving the tank.

 

[emma12321]

Hi,

Since you only have a few fish etc, starve them the day before the move, bag them up or put them in a tupperware tub, if you bag them put them in a polystyrene cooler to keep the temperature up.

Drain the tank, bag the filter to keep the media wet, since its quite a small tank you should be ok to lift it with the substrate in if not bag as much as you can, bag any live plants.

Get to the new house place tank where you want it, fill it with dechlorinated water and turn heater on to get it to correct temp, add everything you removed minus the fish. Add the fish once the temp is ok. The fish will be fine if they have to stay bagged all day but bacteria will start dying in the filter after a couple of hours. If you can't set the tank up the same day put the fish in a tub or bucket with the filter and heater running until the tank is set up.

Take the tank in your own car unless the removal company are insured for fish tanks. Pack it last then it can be unpacked first.

Hope this helps

Emma

 

[catxx]

i'm doing this at the end of the month, similar distance.
only i have 4 tanks and 4 fish to move. (all tanks 7 US gallons and under)

what i'm planning on doing is having 2 buckets for the 2 filtered tanks and putting as much water as i can in there without it risking spilling or the bucket breaking. for the 2 unfiltered i think i might risk with 100% water change (and the 2 fishies bag water, maybe bag some extra old water for them) they've coped with 100% before and the water chemistry should be the same, will check before hand.

but yeah, after i've done all that and bagged the fish and packed them away in critter keepers/newspaper/paper towels/bubble wrap, i think it's going to be a great big panicy juggling act. the fish will be less stressed than me i can promise that!

 

[CFC]

Im doing this in 2 weeks, only i have 13 tanks to move, only 9 of them currently have fish in but three of them are big tanks of 150-200 gallons and i have fish up to 24" long to move.

For a fairly small tank like yours i would buy four 25 litre plastic water barrels from a hardware or camping shop (some lfs sell them too). Bag all your fish and filter media and place them into a cooler box or polystyrene box. Then syphon the water from the tank into the 4 barrels and scoop all your substrate into a black bin liner.
Set the tank back up at the new house, pour in the substrate and water, release the fish into the tank, place filter media back in the filter and plug everything in, job done.

 

[laurasmithuk]

im so daunted by the prospect! im thinking of letting my parenst have the tank but that will still mean moving it downstairs!

 

[love cichlids]

Not looking forward to when I have to move. I have 5 tanks ranging from 10 gallon to 55 gallon all with fish in it. It was hard enough getting the 55 gallon home that I bought from a friend and it was totally empty. I am going to have to get a truck JUST for the tanks or move one at a time the day before or after I move in. Last time I moved I had a 20 gallon with goldfish in it that I had to bag and transport as much of the tank water I could get into a rubber tub with a lid. Take your time and make sure you plan where you want your tanks in new place, makes it easier and faster to set tank up to get fish in there quickly.

 

[Bloo]

It's not a joyful job Laura (house moving is stressful enough!) but it's really not that bad to move a tank your size

Best of luck and to you too CFC !