seamonster124
New member
why not
Today's Rant on Quarantining
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why not
heathlindner25
New member
Good way to kill fish..better to keep matrix in a mesh bag stored in your sump and placed in your qt when needed.
jimmyj7090
aka John K
My girlfriend is kind of pregnant. We really need to work on innovating and improving that whole definition thing.
Sorry, couldn't help it
^ ^^^
I agree.
Personally I use tank transfer for all new fish ;to acclimate, quarantine and provide preventative treatment for crytocaryon irritans (ich) . Ammonia takes a few days to form from any degrading organics; so it's not an issue with a 3 day stay and move to new water most of the time . A little ammonia detoxifier on day two ,just in case, can be used but is rarely necessary IME,when new salt water is used for the transfer tanks. After 4 transfers ( 12 days) the fish can go to a cycled qt for further observation and treatment of other maladies if the occur. . This thread may be of interest:
http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2185929&highlight=fish+acclimation+and+quarantine
I agree.
Personally I use tank transfer for all new fish ;to acclimate, quarantine and provide preventative treatment for crytocaryon irritans (ich) . Ammonia takes a few days to form from any degrading organics; so it's not an issue with a 3 day stay and move to new water most of the time . A little ammonia detoxifier on day two ,just in case, can be used but is rarely necessary IME,when new salt water is used for the transfer tanks. After 4 transfers ( 12 days) the fish can go to a cycled qt for further observation and treatment of other maladies if the occur. . This thread may be of interest:
http://www.reefcentral.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2185929&highlight=fish+acclimation+and+quarantine
skeeter_ca
Active member
I don't quarantine. I had some problems early in my experience with Ich and such but I am not sure if I grew out of it or have just been lucky. Probably the latter. I have been thinking about setting up a QT when my Auto-water changer is finished as I could just pump the old DT water directly into my QT tank everyday. But I went looking for a Starry Blenny because I wanted some GHA taken care of. I found one that is a beauty. I noticed in the store the left eyebrow thingy was missing. Wondered if it would grow back but thought if it didn't no big deal. Plop, in he goes in my tank. It's been a month and no problems. Lucky again. Maybe but then I notice something. Something I didn't notice before. His left eye is gone. It's healed over and he seems healthy. I realized I never noticed it before because he always and I mean always faces toward the right side of the tank. That is so "he" can see "me" when I am in front of the tank. If I had a QT tank I would have seen his injury and maybe taken him back. Now I am just going to keep him for several reason. He is doing his job keeping the GHA down, been a good tank mate to the others and most importantly there is no way I would be able to get him out of that tank without tearing it down completely. I am now designing a QT system to go with my auto-water changer.
ThRoewer
New member
The major issue with store quarantine is that not all stores would do it. And even if they would, could you trust them to do it right?
Every aquarist must do their own quarantine to be sure to keep their tanks free of avoidable trouble.
That said, it would be in the best interest of a store to employ some level of quarantine and preventive treatment to avoid unnecessary losses.
One store here does it for corals in the form of dipping them at least once a week, but fish go still all without being quarantined.
Regardless of that I still dip all the corals I buy there (as does the staff when they take something home), an no new fish goes straight into the display tank without spending a few months in quarantine.
Every aquarist must do their own quarantine to be sure to keep their tanks free of avoidable trouble.
That said, it would be in the best interest of a store to employ some level of quarantine and preventive treatment to avoid unnecessary losses.
One store here does it for corals in the form of dipping them at least once a week, but fish go still all without being quarantined.
Regardless of that I still dip all the corals I buy there (as does the staff when they take something home), an no new fish goes straight into the display tank without spending a few months in quarantine.
cougareyes
New member
My issue with quarantining is that most set up a very stressful, unfiltered or under filtered, prison like atmosphere for their quarantine tank. I polled 3 LFS about success rates of their customers who quarantine compared to those that don't; they all concluded that there was no discernible difference. Most people induce more stress and an environment which would promote disease in their quarantine tank than if they would put the fish directly into their display. I have a quarantine that is more of an observation tank; it's a 40g breeder, fully filtered and set up as a mini display tank. In years I've had 1 outbreak of ich in 1 of my 4 displays, and all the inhabitants had been established for almost a year.
MondoBongo
Obligate Feeder Obsessed
that's the most useless, weak anecdotal evidence against something i've heard all week.
it's also demonstrably false, for many reasons.
if QT didn't work, do you think every major reputable public institution such as zoos and aquariums would be bothering with it? no, of course not, it would be a waste of their time and money.
these places, and hobbyists, quarantine for the same reaons:
1. it is highly effective at keeping a disease free display
2. it is a much better husbandry practice and considerably less cruel to your animals, catching disease and parasitic infection before it has a chance to run rampant in your full population.
3. the cost benefit analysis is clear: an effective quarantine protocol saves you money, time, and stress on yourself, and the animals.
you think being moved to a different tank every couple days for a week or so is stressful? try being covered in ecto-parasites living in your flesh.
shred5
Premium Member
I fight with this all the time.. Some fish like tangs do not do well in quarantine and I feel better introducing them into a reef that is bigger and more comfortable for them. Ich to me mainly attacks stressed fish. But the real problem is not quarantining that fish actually endangers all the fish and not just that one fish.
Quarantine and tank transfer can be managed with less stress than a hurried introduction of a potentially infested fish to a reef tank. It offers advantages: in acclimation to prevent osmotic shock or ammonia toxicity exposure during drip acclimation, no aggression from tank mates, less competition to encourage feeding, opportunities for close observation.
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cougareyes
New member
I wasn't arguing against quarantining, my point was that alot of hobbyist do more harm than good with their set up and methods of quarantining. Throwing massive amounts of medications at seemingly healthy fish, we know what meds do to humans you think not fish; then they just die a month, 6 months, or a year later for some unknown reason. Maybe you just liquified their organs. My 1 ick outbreak happened after quarantine and no new introductions for almost a year, where did it come from; it's a gamble either way. Yes your odds are better if you quarantine, but only if done right. Alot of the disease and death is actually brought on by the quarantine set up and methods itself. The poll I took demonstrated that with all the variables there are no guarantees. People that don't quarantine have good luck, no disease and successful tanks; and people that do quarantine still get disease and unknown fish deaths. If you quarantine in small jail cells with no filtration and dose a *load of meds, you are better off not quarantining.
On another note I live in Las Vegas and we have our share of public aquariums and the like, you would be disgusted by how disposable these organization treat their fish; and their quarantine facilities are top notch, just a smaller version of their displays. And if a fish gets a hangnail they just kill it and get another one, so It always bothers me when a hobbyist uses that as an example.
On another note I live in Las Vegas and we have our share of public aquariums and the like, you would be disgusted by how disposable these organization treat their fish; and their quarantine facilities are top notch, just a smaller version of their displays. And if a fish gets a hangnail they just kill it and get another one, so It always bothers me when a hobbyist uses that as an example.
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Exactly.
mcozad829
Premium Member
I have been in the hobby for 6 years now, for the first 4 years or so it was fowlr tanks and I never quarantined anything, and I never had an issue with disease. At that point I became active on this forum and started realizing the importance of quarantine so I bought a 20 long and started quarantining as observation only. I would let my fish sit in the QT for 6 weeks and if they seemed perfectly healthy on to the display they went. I did this up until we moved and I broke down that system and sold it. When I set up my new tank in my new house I decided not to quarantine as I had never had a problem and when I did QT, I had never caught any disease while in QT. Fast forward to last week when my fox face got ich, velvet, and a secondary bacterial infection within a matter of days after I introduced a pair of clowns. Fox face died, I had to pull most of the rock out of the DT to catch the other fish, and now the three remaining are in the 20l. They say lessons not learned in blood are soon forgot, despite knowing the risks I went back to my old method because I had never seen any benefit when I did QT. Never again for me, Nothing will ever touch my DT without going through QT because last week just sucked. I have even gone so far as I am converting an attached storage unit in my garage to a QT and Propagation room, adding ac/heat, dedicated breakers with extra outlets. While my DT stays fallow I am spending the money I would have on fish and corals to have separate invert and fish QT systems in place. I won't so much as buy another snail until those QT systems are ready to go. Just a Rant by someone who was recently bit in the arse by my lack of QT.
Same here but I have been in the hobby for nearly 50 years if you count fresh water as well as salt water which has only been 30 years. I usually never provide longevity in the hobby numbers because that does not really tell much about the type of experiences encountered.
Sad but true. We can advise, but until folks lose everything by rolling the dice, I guess the lesson will not be learned. There is no vendor that adequately quarantines. What is worse is that many/most/all vendors tend to run a low level of copper in their system which masks many parasites.
igot2gats
Deeeetroit Basketball!
Reality is what you make of it. If enough people demand it, it will happen eventually.
I trust myself and the best known methods for the best chance for a disease free aqurium. Acclimation and quarantine via tank transfer plus additional observation in a cycled tank and treatments as necessary for a range of diseases if they present is my reality.
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skp
New member
I don't think it will happen. I wish it did. The lfs needs to get as many fish, healthy or unhealthy out of their hands and into ours (minus our money). They won't even hold a fish for me for more than a couple extra days because they could just sell to someone more willing to take a 'chance'. If nobody wanted to take a chance, that is, if the LFS knew they had to quarantine and make sure every fish was disease free before selling then the price needs to go up and there needs to be enough of a demand for the fish at the higher prices. How much higher would the prices have to be? Let's think about it, how many tanks would you need to have any kind of volume in sales especially after considering that a new order cannot go into an existing tank or it will reset the clock for that tank.
I think there's a reason why online vendors just offer a money back guarantee because that is more cost effective.
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