Overpopulation of QT

[MarkD40]

I have a 20 gallon QT that has a biowheel filter on the back that I keep running on my sump to keep the wheel biologically active until I need it. When I get a new fish< it goes into the QT and I move the biowheel filter from the sump to the QT. Works fine for one fish.

Suppose I get an outbreak if ich in my display and I am able to remove all 8 fish. They can go into the QT but there is no way that little biowheel is going to handle the amount of ammonia produced. Also that many fish in such a small tank for six weeks would be very stressful IMO. So what do you do?

 

[Jeremy Blaze]

Multiple fish in one tank is not quarantine. You need one tank per fish.

 

[ambaratur]

<a href=showthread.php?s=&postid=7338769#post7338769 target=_blank>Originally posted</a> by Jeremy Blaze
Multiple fish in one tank is not quarantine. You need one tank per fish.

Interesting - I think that is the first time I have seen that piece of advice.

So if you have 2 fish with ich you have need to have 2 quarrantine tanks?

Or if you purchase 2 clownfish you need to quarrantine them in 2 different tanks?

(Still a noob here - just learning)

 

[Jeremy Blaze]

Yep. Look up the definition of quarantine. It is not quarantine if there are others together.

 

[keefsama2003]

i have been in the hobby 3 years never heard that from anyone either

yes you would probably need a little bigger tank but if they are all being treated for ich then the treatment is the same there is no need for seperate tank for each fish.

just make sure u have a spare container doesnt even have to be a tank just something big you can use to house all the fish in.

 

[Jeremy Blaze]

Well, most do not say that, but again if you look at the meaning of quarantine, and the purpose, it does little good to place several fish together.

 

[Jeremy Blaze]

Because of that, I have 9 10 gallon tanks on a central system, with the returns going trough a UV to prevent spreading of problems.

 

[Costa Randy]

Quarantine Enforced isolation or restriction of free movement imposed to prevent the spread of contagious disease.

I would agree that in a perfect world the best solution would be to isolate, or quarantine, each fish in an individual tank. You probably should not just mix any and all fish species in a small tank. However, I know of people who have successfully put several fish into a single quarantine tank that have gone on to prosper in a display tank. The most I have attempted is 4 fish in a 35 gallon tank, but none of the 'quarantined' fish ever displayed any signs of ich or any other ailments.

 

[ambaratur]

But would having all those tanks linked also break the deffinition of "Quarantine"? That sounds like the setup of a traditional LFS - (except they keep multiple fish in each tank) and I would not consider their tanks to be a quarantine environment.

I think that perhaps there is a deffinition of quarantine that reefers use for their purposes that may be slightly different than the dictionary deffinition. But hey - I could be wrong.

 

[Jeremy Blaze]

That is the purpose of the uv, all water going into the tanks pass through the uv, thus (theroleticy) eliminating the spreading of such.

 

[MarkD40]

Jeremy, if you quarantined in a bare bottom tank with good water turnover and had all the water pass through a UV sterilizer would that kill the ich in the water column and prevent/cure any ich in the quarantined fish over time. I am talking about a fish with no evidence of disease.