DamienHanna
New member
Hi all,
I'm writing this note because I am so fed up with my hit and miss success rate in quarantine. I have been an active marine enthusiast for many years and consider myself pretty knowledebale and concientious. I suycessfully maintain 2 large systems (a 240G reef and a 300G FOWLR) and have good healthy specimens of both fish and inverts in both tanks.
My quarantine record however is very mixed and its come to the surface again since I decided to add a few more fish to my pretty lightly stocked 300. I maintain a good quarantine setup; a 40G tank with live rock (I don't medicate in the QT system and like to have rock in there), a good hang-on-tank skimmer, excellent circulation and mechanical filtration. I change 10% of the water every other day and do not have any lights on the system. I run hyposaline conditions in the QT tank and reduce salinity to 1.009 over the course of a week when start quarantining new specimens and then maintain it for 4 four weeks.
I purchased a couple of specimens at the weekend; a small yellow tang and a nice medium size golden butterfly. Sometimes I quantine individually and sometimes together; I know the risk of having more than one speciem in QT at the same time. They both looked healthy in the store, were eating fine and had been in the store's tanks for a few weeks (I visit regularly). I acclimated the specimens with a drip feed from the tank to their bag (the store is only 10 mins away so no issues with depressed Ph, lack of oxygen or toxin build up). I netted the new guys and released them into the new system and all looked great. The butterfly immediately started to explore the system, picking at the rocks and generally looking great. So it continued for the next 24 hours. He ate mysis and picked at some flake food and continued to cruise the system with obvious interest. Water params were fine; no ammonia, no nitrite, stable Ph and nitrate < 5ppm (I used 50% new water and 50% water from my reef system to seed the QT setup).
24 hours later he didn't look so good; his breathing was more rapid and he wasn't moving around as much. Yes, it's happened again I said. Every time I see a new fish get into this state the result is the same - progressive deterioration with increasing respiration rate and then death. Sure enough, 24 hours later he was dead and everything in the tank was perfect. The yellow tang was swimming around happy as a clam and eating fine.
I'd seen it many times before in my QT process and reminded myself why I buy so few fish; its such a crap shoot. The results are the same regardless of whether they are store bough specimens or mail order; I would say that 30% of my QT subjects end up this way. They start out great for a few days or even weeks and then take a sudden turn, start breathing rapidly and then die within 24 hours. Its so frustrating and I feel so helpless when it happens. This was an expensive speciem ($130) and I took a lot of care and prepared well for the QT process and still it suffered and died and it ****es me off.
What am I doing wrong here?
Are some fish just destined to get more stressed than others?
Is it possible to reverse this death spiral once it starts?
I have read everything I can about stress management (stable temp, Ph and water params, low lighting, plenty of hiding places, quiet location etc. etc.) and have done it all but still this happens. I am just not satisfied with my survival record and want to figure this out. I would love to hear from other folks who have great success with the quarantine process and get any advice or feedback on my process. I hate to see a healthy speciem go downhill so fast and be unable to do anything to help...
--Damien
I'm writing this note because I am so fed up with my hit and miss success rate in quarantine. I have been an active marine enthusiast for many years and consider myself pretty knowledebale and concientious. I suycessfully maintain 2 large systems (a 240G reef and a 300G FOWLR) and have good healthy specimens of both fish and inverts in both tanks.
My quarantine record however is very mixed and its come to the surface again since I decided to add a few more fish to my pretty lightly stocked 300. I maintain a good quarantine setup; a 40G tank with live rock (I don't medicate in the QT system and like to have rock in there), a good hang-on-tank skimmer, excellent circulation and mechanical filtration. I change 10% of the water every other day and do not have any lights on the system. I run hyposaline conditions in the QT tank and reduce salinity to 1.009 over the course of a week when start quarantining new specimens and then maintain it for 4 four weeks.
I purchased a couple of specimens at the weekend; a small yellow tang and a nice medium size golden butterfly. Sometimes I quantine individually and sometimes together; I know the risk of having more than one speciem in QT at the same time. They both looked healthy in the store, were eating fine and had been in the store's tanks for a few weeks (I visit regularly). I acclimated the specimens with a drip feed from the tank to their bag (the store is only 10 mins away so no issues with depressed Ph, lack of oxygen or toxin build up). I netted the new guys and released them into the new system and all looked great. The butterfly immediately started to explore the system, picking at the rocks and generally looking great. So it continued for the next 24 hours. He ate mysis and picked at some flake food and continued to cruise the system with obvious interest. Water params were fine; no ammonia, no nitrite, stable Ph and nitrate < 5ppm (I used 50% new water and 50% water from my reef system to seed the QT setup).
24 hours later he didn't look so good; his breathing was more rapid and he wasn't moving around as much. Yes, it's happened again I said. Every time I see a new fish get into this state the result is the same - progressive deterioration with increasing respiration rate and then death. Sure enough, 24 hours later he was dead and everything in the tank was perfect. The yellow tang was swimming around happy as a clam and eating fine.
I'd seen it many times before in my QT process and reminded myself why I buy so few fish; its such a crap shoot. The results are the same regardless of whether they are store bough specimens or mail order; I would say that 30% of my QT subjects end up this way. They start out great for a few days or even weeks and then take a sudden turn, start breathing rapidly and then die within 24 hours. Its so frustrating and I feel so helpless when it happens. This was an expensive speciem ($130) and I took a lot of care and prepared well for the QT process and still it suffered and died and it ****es me off.
What am I doing wrong here?
Are some fish just destined to get more stressed than others?
Is it possible to reverse this death spiral once it starts?
I have read everything I can about stress management (stable temp, Ph and water params, low lighting, plenty of hiding places, quiet location etc. etc.) and have done it all but still this happens. I am just not satisfied with my survival record and want to figure this out. I would love to hear from other folks who have great success with the quarantine process and get any advice or feedback on my process. I hate to see a healthy speciem go downhill so fast and be unable to do anything to help...
--Damien
He was fine at first but two weeks later he looked as if his mouth had exploded
