I am moving my fish to a bigger tank, need suggestions, if you please =)

Sylverclaws

Hello! I am a new fish hobbiest, and still learning the ropes. Currently I have a ten gallon tank, which is WAY to small for my fish. I am going to be getting a much bigger tank soon, I'm thinking a 20-30 gallon tank. My enthusiasm has caused me to be dumb and bite off more than I can chew. I have gotten too many fish and they need a bigger home.

I was wondering how I should go about it, I have never moved fish to a new tank before, and I atleast know better than to move them into a brand new tank right off the bat. x.x Bah. I am not sure how to go about it, I was thinking I could move all their current water in, but I am afraid it might stir up too much from the gravel and cause them to get sick or stressed out.
Am I going to need to fully cycle the new tank, or would it be possible for me to slowly move some of the water over there over the course of a week or so, or would that be bad?

I should probably tell you guys what I have in the tank! I currently have two live planted plants, and several of those free-floating ones that are kinda viney-like, one fake plant which I am debating on getting rid of, and a medium canyon-style rock formation. I also have green gravel, and a heater and filter that came with it. The filter brand is Aqueon. I will probably need a different filter and heater for the bigger tank though, these will most likely be too small.

As for fish: Tooo many, and I kicked myself for my enthusiasm! I have two emerald cory, two gold dust molly, two silver molly, one orange creamsicle molly, one black molly, two marble molly and two black sail-fin mollly. One of the silvers is a male, and one of the sail-fins is a male, the rest are all female. Except I am not sure about my cories, I don't know how to tell with them. I also have a breeding net with nine babies in it, they will be too big for it in about a week or two though. As you can see, I bit off more than I could chew.

I don't know what came over me! x.x I initially had eight fish in there which was fine for them, still intended to get a bigger tank though! I know mollies need more space, the tank itself was originally for my six Platy's, which died of Ich. At the time I didn't know what it was, and for some reason the girl at petco didn't know what one of the most common bacteria's was. x.x
Well, the other day I had gone to petco to give them an aggressive gold dust male that was disrupting my tank and had killed my Dalmation Lyretail molly, whose mate had died a few months ago, and he was trying to kill two other females, so I was down a few and intended to only replace the two I had lost recently....They ended up having Sail-Fin mollies, which I had been trying to get for months! They never have dalmation lyretails anymore, they're just as hard to find, and I didn't find them this time. =( So my brain stopped working and I purchased a male and female sail-fin, and two marble molly to replace the damlations I had lost. I also bought the black molly female that I had seen in the shop for the last two months. It was alone in a tank with the wrong fish. lol I felt bad for her. Yeah, I over-did it, so I need to hurry and get a bigger tank before problems happen aside from my stupidity.

The one inch of fish per gallon of water I heard is actually very bad to go by! So I am wondering if I should go with the 30 gallon, I intend to keep atleast two of the fry I have, maybe three, so I will end up with 15-16 fish. 30 Gallons is big enough for them, right?

Ah, sorry, overboard me again, writing a book! I do intend to get the bigger tank, but I really just need suggestions on how to move them and possibly, if there is a safe way, prepare it for them quicker. The last thing I want is to stress them out or put them in the tank before they should be in there when I've already pressed them for space, although they don't seem unhappy, I know it can cause problems.

I'm not sure if this info is needed or not either, but I have had this tank set up for about...I think five months now, maybe six. Other than the issue with my aggressive Gold dust, I haven't had issues with it, but that was before I got too many fish and I don't want to chance it. So it's been nice and cycled for several months now. When I get my new tank I intend to get a water test kit for myself. My last water test at the shop, they said all of it came out normal, so I took their word for it, but I don't have numbers to give, my apologies.

Help is good, and if you think the number of fish I have is -still- going to be too many for a 30 gallon, feel free to let me have it! It wasn't very smart of me as is to get so many. ^^; This site is just lovely for learning and getting help with just about everything, and most of you are far more knowledgable than I am about these things. Petco would probably tell me I could have 30 fish in there! They told me ten fish would be fine for it as is. lol
I would rather go by what the more experienced users here think. If 15 is too many for a 30 gal, I will have to suck it up and give them away over possibly making them unhappy and ill.

Thank you all in advance for taking the time to read this numbskulls book of blah and pleas!

jaysee

When you set up the new tank, just move everything over including the filter. Also, put some of the media from the 10 gallon filter in the new tanks filter - this will speed up the colonization of the new media.

thekoimaiden

First off, welcome to the forum and to the wonderful world of fishkeeping. It's a fascinating hobby, but you have to watch out for MTS (multiple tank syndrome)! It's sounds like you're well on your way to developing a case.

Second, I'd like to direct you to our tropical fish profiles. You can find the link to these in the upper lefthand corner in between "User CP" and "Aquarium Log." Here you'll find pages devoted to fish species; these pages contain information like the minimum tank size and temperature requirements. Most will also have pictures so you can be sure you're looking at the right fish. You may also see a fish's name highlighted like this: Sailfin Molly or Common Molly or Bronze Cory. You can click on those links to get to the fish's profile.

Moving fish between tanks is never fun. I recently did it and it almost drove me mad. The hardest part is catching the fish. Everyone seems to have their own technique. I just use two nets: one to corral the fish and the other to scoop them up. It really helps if the water level is lowered.

As for keeping the cycle, as Jaysee said worry about the filter not the water. So very few bacteria live in the water that moving over the water will basically not do anything for the cycle. If the water in your tank is different from your tap water, then it might be a good idea to put as much water as possible in the new tank from the old tank. Putting the gravel from the old tank into the new tank will also help keep the cycle as the substrate is where a huge part of the bacteria that comprise the cycle live.

As for what you should do, moving them to the 30 gal is a great idea. Personally, I'd go a little larger because livebearers have that pesky habit of reproducing like wild as you've seen. Really the only way to stop it is have all males. You should keep the 10 gallon tank up and working and use that as a nursery. If you can grow the babies to a sellable size, maybe you can work out a trade with your local fish store.

Sylverclaws

Thanks, you two!

Yeah, I -want- MTS. lol Currently I don't have room for that, nor the knowledge to try it yet. I'd -really- be biting off more than I can chew if I jumped in and got ten tanks! I am also not living in my own place, so the biggest tank I can get right now would be a 30 gallon, and that's pushing it according to my grandda. There will be atleast one tank in every room if I have my way once I get my own home and experience up. ^_~
I do intend to keep my 10 gallon set up since I want my fish to breed. I LOVE having babies around. They're fun to watch and care for. I haven't lost any of the ones I've managed to get into the net! I have nine fry from three batches. My first taste of having babies in the tank unfortunatly ended very badly, I adopted a pregnant mother that was being bullied at the shop and she gave birth in the bag! All but one of her babies died over the course of a week because they were premature, and though that baby is two weeks older than seven others, about a month older than the newest single, it's still half the size at about 5-6 weeks old now. He's a Silver molly, the other babies are Gold Dusts, so they're around the same sized kind of fish, the mothers are the same size right now anyway I'm a little worried he's not going to be a very healthy fish, I think he's stunted. He's barely a quarter inch bigger than he was at birth, the other babies have tripled in size since birth. I saved a single gold dust baby from my third batch, if you can call it that. The mother didn't even -look- pregnant. But the baby is doing well. Watching them grow is so much fun!
I want the mothers to have a larger, comfortable place to give birth, so that tank will become my "breeding net" and nursery. Otherwise I have to watch them like a hawk, which I do anyways, and move the other fish out of the tank until the mother is finished. I put a mother in the net once and she just ate the babies. x.x Plus, breeding nets take up room, have a possibility of fish getting stuck behind them, stressed mothers, and they are hard to clean and not very roomy. Though I found that putting a snail in there with the fry keeps the yuck down and no food waste. Got rid of the algae that the babies couldn't reach as well, though I know it wont hurt them, I just couldn't get it off! The snails unfortunatly came with the plants I purchased, so I decided to make use of them and clean out the smaller ones I can find, they like to try and over-run you. Haha, well, so long as they don't go too far, they're wonderful cleaners and don't bother the fish at all.
My current babies are almost ready to go into the bigger tank and get even larger before going to their new homes. My creamsicle is still big enough to eat them though, so I wont chance it just yet, maybe one more week. Though I admit I will be sad to give them up. And I never thought about working something out with a store, most of them will only take them to adopt, but wont pay you for them. I am going to check around. =) If I give them good sized, healthy babies, maybe I can get a little for them to go into my tank fees.