Drip acclimate question
Drip acclimate question
Sorry for the loss. Yes flukes unfortunately can kill within that time frame; same with other parasites like velvet and ich which is why it's best to always do a full qt before anything goes into your display.
If the display is empty now (fishless) I would suggest keeping it that way for a minimum of 76 days and then start with some easier fish to start with.
Also dip acclimation is the worst thing you can do specially when getting a fish that has spend some time in a closed bag. What happens is as soon as you open the bag up and expose it to air, the ph changes causing an ammonia spike in the bag which is deadly. you want to get the fish out of the bag and the water it was in as soon as the bag is opened generally within less then 30 min. Do a temp acclimation by floating the unopened bag in the tank water for a while and then open the bag, check salinity, adjust qt if needed and transfer the fish.
I do a 50min formalin bath for all new arrivals, followed by 2 weeks of ttm or 30 days of cp ( depending on the type of fish) and then 2-3 weeks of observation. I do at least 2 rounds of prazipro 5-7 days apart as well. No furan2 or other antibiotics unless I see signs of infections. Recently there have been an increasing number of prazipro resistant flukes so keep that in mind. Might have to use hypo or couple of formalin baths to resolve it which is why it's always best to observe a couple of extra weeks after any treatments in qt.
Hi, apologies if I am hijacking this thread but I am interested in the comments above about drip acclimation. I am a new reefer with a 65g tank (53g display, 12g sump) and a 9g QT. Currently stocked with 2x Clowns, 2x Fire Gobys, 1x Bluestreak cleaner wrasse, 1x Yellow Tang, 1x Hermit crab, 1x Coral Banded Shrimp, 4 corals + hitchhikers. Parameters are 1.024 salinity, 0 ppm Ammonia, Nitrites and Nitrates, 0.25 ppm Phosphate, 1450 Mg, 450 Ca, 9.8 kH, 8.4 pH. QT is the same but at 1.020 salinity, and at times traces of Ammonia and Nitrates (but nothing > 0.5 ppm).
My fish and corals are purchased from the LFS. They are in the bag 20 mins generally before I get them home. My approach is to float and open the bag immediately, wait 15 mins then drip acclimate for about 90 mins. I try to replace at least 50% of original water during this process. Fish go into the QT, inverts and corals straight into the DT. After drip acclimating the animals are removed from the water and introduced to the QT or DT. For those that go into the QT, after their time I again temp and drip acclimate (using a large jug) into the DT and again only transfer the animals not any water. I am going to use a Coral RX dip in future but haven't done so to date.
All fish have transferred well and are doing fine. I recently introduced 2 Coral Banded Shrimps, but they fought in the bag and although both went into the DT only one survived. I suspect they were not a mated pair and were just tolerating each other in the LFS tank and the 90 mins in the bag was too much for them.
What do you think about my approach to introducing animals into the QT/DT?
Please note I am in Australia so don't have access to some of the treatments you are mentioning due to bio-security laws (e.g. no antibiotics).
Thanks in advance!
