Dual question: Extended Leave * Moving - Water quality

Opopanax · Post by **Opopanax** » Thu Mar 02, 2006 2:31 pm

I've been very careful with my water quality. I had a phosphate bloom (my idiot brother dumped 1/4 of my food in the back corner and I did not see it to clean it up, talk about over feeding) not too long ago so I have been doing 20% water changes almost every week (between 1 and 1.5 weeks) in order to keep the water quality up.

Here's the problem. I'm going to be out of town for up to 3 or 4 weeks soon and I'm concern about the water quality of the tank. My shrimp finally reproduced so I don't want the water to go foul and end up losing the new shrimp. Obviously, I can't trust my brother to do my water changes for me. Anyone have any recommendations of what I can do to decrease the chances of the water getting really foul in the 3-4 week time? I don't anything in ther ebut shrimp, fish, and a whole lot of plants (Java moss needs to be pruned soon it's taking a 1/3 of the tank).

The 2nd issue I have is I may be moving (thus the 3-4 week disappearance). It will be a 2.5 hour drive in early spring weather in Wisconsin (Read cold). I'm not very confident I could find all the shrimp and net them safely into a breather bag for the trip. I had thought of leaving the tanks for last and draining all but a inche or two of water. and then moving them. I'm concern obviously for the shrimp (and fish in my other tank but htose are easier to find and scoop) and the integrity of the tanks.

Ideas?

demented_lullaby · Post by **demented_lullaby** » Thu Mar 02, 2006 2:52 pm

I would not suggest leaving animals in a tank while moving them. It tends to get a bit rough on them plus the substrate kicks up debries. I've heard of someone doing this and all their poor guppies died.

Remove all the plants into a bucket with about half tank water in it. You can also transport the shrimp in the same bucket. The Java Moss is a great thing for the shrimp to feel a bit more comfortable in transport. Net as many as you can out, try to be very thorough with this. Try to take as much water with you as you can also.

For the time your gone it's a bit worrying. Is there anyone responsible you can trust with it at all? Or can you talk to your brother about it maybe? Probably easier said than done

. The most important thing while your gone is for them not to be overfed. I know your pain, my bro did the same thing the first time I left in my bettas tank.

badflash · Post by **badflash** » Thu Mar 02, 2006 5:40 pm

Stop feeding them a little bit before you need to go. Do not give them extra to "tide them over". Make sure there are suitable plants in with them and they will be fine. You are probably over feeding them even without your brother's help. They sell these animals in torture chambers with no way to feed them and they live for years even so. Don't worry about 3 or 4 weeks.

Caridina sp. · Post by **Caridina sp.** » Thu Mar 02, 2006 10:07 pm

Put your lights on a timer, the algae will sustain them and the water quality won't decline very quickly because your not adding nutrients on a daily basis. Don't get an automatic feeder or one of those crappy vacation feeder blocks they will hurt your water quality... It would take a long time to starve most dwarf shrimp to death.

cheesenips · Post by **cheesenips** » Fri Mar 03, 2006 2:39 am

In many situations when your tank is well maintained (established, stable water) water changes can be put back to a month or even more, some shrimp keeps would not even change thier water only topple water from evaporation. I am not suggesting it but it is possible. Some factors you would want to consider in doing would be the size of your tanks and the population of shrimp you have in there. 10 adults shrimps with some babies in a well established tank of a considerable size with plenty of plants would probally be safe to be left alone for a couple of weeks.

Personally, I keep tanks at home with shrimp and I only return home on the weekends so they get about 1 feeding a week so during the week days they just seem fine munching on algae and picking on whatever is around (sponge filter, mulm from plants, ect.) As for water changes, I sometimes go up to 3-4 weeks without changing water with my busy schedual. Even with this my shrimp are reproducing at a steady rate.

For your second issue, I have tanks in school also. When the semester ends I have to move everything back home which includes my tanks. Fortunately my tanks in school are pretty small (10 gal and 5gal) but they have shrimp in them. I live about 1-2 hours drive from school. I start preparing for the move a day or two before the big day.

First I would find as many water containers as I can (clean water bottles-the bigger the better), then I would trim the plants (try to get them as low as possible, for bigger plants I would have to uproot them and replant later), then I would remove things that would add weight to the tank (bigger rocks, wood, ect), unplug and store equipment in a safe place (for filters take good care of them, you dont want the bacteria colonies to die during the trip), then I would start draining the tank (saving as much water as I can in the containers) leaving about 4-5 inches of water along with the shrimps in the tank. After that I would carry the tank into the car (try not to move the tank that much after it been in the car, sloshing water can stir up the water alot and plants would get all messy) Once I get back home I would refill the tank and return everything back to the tank. If you need to fill the tank up with new water because you could not transport all the water, do it slowly in small amounts at a time (the trick is to keep everything as stable as possible, water parameters I mean)

I have done this move two times (from school and back to school when semester started again) now and in both times I not aware of losing any shrimp. I was during the middle of winter when I did the moves so the temperature outside of the car was in the range of freezing. Again the feasiblity of this for you depends alot on your tank size. I orginally thought about removing everything from the tank but I thought that would stress the animals more because with so many ways of distubances and changes.

Again, I am just saying what worked with me. Use proper judgement

xerxeswasachump · Post by **xerxeswasachump** » Thu Mar 09, 2006 12:08 pm

I've had to do the same thing, moving to and from school, twice so far this year. Unfortunately, my only tank is 40 gallons (with 20 of water) so the whole operations is crazy. Plus i have frogs and fish to deal with.
I've always taken the whole tank apart and drained it as much as possible. Leaving just the gravel on the bottom. I think the next time i will keep a small amount of water in the tank just to keep the bacteria alive. I keep all of the animals in tupperware containers and nalgene bottles (except the frogs, who get their own empty 10 gallon tank). I try to keep as much of the tank water as possible and i put the filter media in its own tupperware container.
In the winter i was careful to warm up the car ahead of time so as not to shock the animals too much. I've never had any losses during/after a move so i guess i'm not screwing up too badly.

I have a new problem though. My spring break starts on friday and i won't have access to my tank for 10 days (sort of, i can try to come back early). I was thinking about getting one of those vacation blocks but apparently they aren't worth it. My dorm room gets no natural light, it is like a cave and my RA (and the rest of the reslife staff) won't let me leave my lights plugged, even on a timer. They will, however let me keep my filter plugged in. What will my tank look like after little to no sunlight for 10 days? Will everything be dead?
I'm sure my frogs will be fine (i'll just buy a bunch of crickets right before i leave) and the fish are all pretty fat anyway. I'm mostly worried about my plants and shrimp. I guess there is plenty of algae to eat right now, but after it being dark for a few days i'm sure that stuff will start to die. Is dead algae a useable food source for the animals? Will my filter be able to handle everything (i'm using a fluval 304 submerged filter with media that hasn't been changed in over 2 months, i do clean it though every few weeks)?

badflash · Post by **badflash** » Thu Mar 09, 2006 1:15 pm

Your shrimp will be fine for just 10 days. Why turn off the lights? Don't tell your RA that you've left it plugged in on a timer. Set it up to go on when these guys are asleep.

xerxeswasachump · Post by **xerxeswasachump** » Thu Mar 09, 2006 2:58 pm

Honestly, i have no idea why they won't let me leave the light on. But the specifically said i couldn't leave them plugged in. I can't really get a timer to work well because i have two seperate lights. The only plants i have are java moss, java fern, and then some kind of wort plant that is dying anyway. Worse case scenario i can always get new plants, they cost like a dollar a piece.

Opopanax · Post by **Opopanax** » Thu Mar 09, 2006 3:54 pm

Lights pose a fire risk... i know I know they're probably not incadescent, but that's dorm policy for you.

I know for 10 days your plants will be fine, the shrimp will be fine. You will lose some algae growth with little to no light for 10 days, but you won't kill it all off. It will slow it down immensely.

Fish should be fine for 10 days as long as you don't have to feed some of them to prevent preying on others. Frogs you're going to have crickets so they'll be ok. The only thing I would be worried about is water change, but you probably won't get much of a spike by waiting an extra 3 days. Just don't over feed before you leave.