Corals stressed after move

[Mac1]

Whelp, I found out yesterday who my real friends are (thanks guys)... Tank moving day.

I started bagging at 8 AM, finished placing the last frag back in the tank just shy of midnight. I lost one tang so far, still 2 gobies and a Jawfish MIA, but they always were skittish and shy...

What concerns me, is many of my SPS have bleached completely. They didn't look happy last night, but I figured letting them sleep would turn them around - no luck. A few of my more prize Corals are completely white. They still appear to have flesh on them, but are colorless.

Any chance these corals could pull through? Do they regain their color after a bleaching event if the tissue survives? I've heard of corals bleaching in the wild, and sometime's coming back. I'm kind of assuming they're going to be mounts for frags in a few days, but is there anything I can do to try and help them? Keep the water clean and stable now that it's moved? Getting Carbon and a Fluval today to hook up. Was going to put in a healthy dose of DT's Phyto today too (food always made me feel better). TIA

- Mac

 

[Toadally1]

Mac- I'm getting ready to make a move in a couple of weeks and I'm very nervous about it. Did you have a DSB? I was told not to use the old water in the new set up, because it would contain bacteria and gases that could very well bleach my sps corals if the sand bed is disturbed.

 

[Mac1]

Well, that may be then what happened... Personally I think they got cold in the buckets waiting, but... I guess I'll never know now.

I have a 4" bed in my 90, about the same in the 55 (sump). To lend a little credence to your theory... My Refugium is a 29 w/ about a 6-7 inch bed.... everything that was in there is fine. Granted there wasn't much other than algae, but because it was a much smaller tank, it didn't slosh around hardly at all. Personally I don't think that was it, but hey, who knows. I got a bunch of dead Acro's...

I don't blame you for being nervous, I was crapping my pants most of the time. One piece of advice, if your tank's drilled, is don't bother to touch the Bulkheads. Second time I've moved my 90, and both times I made that mistake. Huge PIA. Either plan on cutting them off and have a spare set on hand before you start, or figure out how to transport the tank w/ them installed (a couple 2x4's under that end works well).

I re-used some of the water from my old setup, was about 50-50 I'd say. I wouldn't go w/ completely new water at the new place, but would definitely make up maybe 50% (you're just going to lose that much in the move), and plan on doing a big change again in a few days (get a fresh bucket of Salt, you'll need it). Make sure your skimmer's nice and clean, and if you can, borrow a Canister Filter and get some polishing filters, Filter floss, whatever you can get to trap the gunk. There's going to be a lot of it.

Two things we did this time different, that worked well:
-Draining. Bring it down to about an inch or two off the sandbed. After pulling out all your rock, there should be a bunch of gunk all stirred up. It will settle on top of your bed. Get a smallish diameter tubing (1/2" ID), for draining the last bit. Find the lo-spot in your sandbed, and make it a little lower (let it settle out for 10 minutes afterwards). Then drain the last bit of water from that lo spot. Have a couple friends - one should be drawing channels in the sand for the water to flow to you, the other should be trying to gently raise the tank on end, to run the water down to your end (not too much, maybe a couple inches total rise). This will get out 90% of the CRAP you just stirred up, and make re-filling a lot easier. Be careful you don't lose siphon tho - Isn't enough tea in China to get me to re-start a siphon like that.
- Refilling - get an old Reef Crystals salt bucket, and place the lid on top of the sanded. Spray your refill water into the center of the lid (plaing it upside down seemed to work best), and let it float up as the water rises, still aiming for the center. We refilled my entire 90 that way, barely disturbed the bed.

Also a good time to put a fresh layer of sand down on top if you're looking to go thicker. That Southdown stuff is pretty good IMO. I wish I would have been able to find a bag or two before yesterday. Instead I put in some more Carribsea (and it cost me 3 times as much).

Have a ton of spare heaters and powerheads on hand, and get twice as many container's as you thought you were going to need.

- Mac

 

[Toadally1]

Mac-At my new place there's already a new tank waiting. I took the opportunity to replace the tank with a built in overflow. I don't have a sand bed to save, so I won't be going through these steps. The old tank don't have a DSB. However the new tank will have. So my plan is to keep all my rock and corals in a couple of rubbermade containers for a few days until the new tank settles after the initial fill. I'll probably end up using some of the old water when I make the move. I have thought maybe about draining enough water out of the old tank so I can move it off the stand and refilling it and just keeping everything in the tank until the move. I need the old stand for the new tank. Maybe this would be the way to go so as not to stress the animals as much. I dunno...just don't want to lose anything, but I'm sure there will be casualties.