Question regarding coral QT tank

[Jeezy85]

Hi all,

I am looking to set up a QT tank for corals and inverts.

My question is if i place a frag in the tank I am suppose to leave this to the coral for 11 weeks for ich to die off as there will be no host.

What happens if I add a new coral during the first corals 11 week period and the new coral I add in happens to contain ICH does this mean the first coral 11 week timer resets?

 

[HumbleFish]

Whenever you add a coral/invert to your QT, you are waiting 76 days just in case an encysted tomont is attached to it. Tomonts cannot transfer so adding a new coral/invert doesn't reset the clock for everyone.

However, there is a slight chance a free swimmer (or protomont) could be loosely attached (from a newer coral/invert that still has a tomont encysted to it.) To mitigate this risk simply rinse the "76 day coral/invert" with DT water, and then discard that water.

 

[ThRoewer]

No fish parasite can/would actually encyst on living coral tissue. Of concern are only the frag plug and sections of exposed skeleton.
So if you re-frag the frag and make sure the new cut is within the living section then there is virtually no chance of getting encysted parasites into your tank. This practice also reduces the chance of importing coral parasite eggs into your system as most of those like to lay their eggs on dead skeleton sections or substrate near the coral base.
I usually re-frag all corals if possible.

Also, that 76 day mark for Cryptocaryon has to be taken with extreme caution since it is only based on one single observation of one single strain. There are indications that some Cryptocaryon strains may be able to stay encysted for much longer, possibly up to a year. But in most cases the cyst will hatch after roughly a month.
Due to this uncertainty, cutting off the plug and dead skeleton sections is the safest approach.

I would dip and rinse the coral before going into QT and before going into the display. The dip will likely kill or demobilize some free parasite stages and the rinse will wash them away. This should minimize the risk of bringing parasites into the DT.

 

[Jeezy85]

Brilliant makes a lot of sense now thank you both for explaining appreciate it

 

[Jeezy85]

Sorry just a couple more questions..

So obviously a coral QT needs to be fish-less. So do i dose nitrates in the tank to keep the the levels steady? do i also need a skimmer for the tank and can i feed amino/trace elements and dose calcium/alk/mag as of when needed?

Thanks:rollface:

 

[HumbleFish]

So obviously a coral QT needs to be fish-less. So do i dose nitrates in the tank to keep the the levels steady? do i also need a skimmer for the tank and can i feed amino/trace elements and dose calcium/alk/mag as of when needed?

You may need to dose both no3 & po4 if nutrient levels are low. But target feeding your corals/inverts frozen food every few days usually helps with that.

I would run a skimmer, and you can dose whatever else you need to keep the corals happy.