kmbyrnes
New member
Now quarantine your livestock!
This is an exciting time for you. Your research, reading, planning, saving and buying are finally coming together into the tank of your dreams. A little patch of ocean in your living room. Beautiful fish swimming peacefully among colorful corals and gracefully flowing anemones. You have spent months to get here and you are ready to stock your tank.
STOP! Did you set up a QT system?
I hate that every day when I get on RC, there is a new thread with the same old content about ich and lack of quarantine. It's sad and it makes me wonder if newcomers really read and learn, or just browse to validate their preconcieved notions. I'm heartbroken seeing folks face such huge disappointment early on when a few simple steps can prevent it. If you haven't already, go to the disease treatment forum and read. Or do a quick search here in the New to the Hobby section. There is an average of one new post per day about getting ich - in this forum alone! Anyone with any time in the hobby will likely have a story of how they lost a tankful of fish due to just one new arrival carrying asymptomatic ich. We have all learned our lesson, and a lot of us want to spare you the heartache by getting you to QT right from the start.
What's that you say?
All that DT equipment is so expensive, I can't afford an another setup.
I don't have room for another tank.
My wife will kill me.
My LFS quarantines all their fish.
It won't happen to me.
This is an expensive hobby. If you can afford a marine aquarium, you can afford a QT setup. It will not add much cost to your current investment and will certainly help protect that investment long term. The Petco dollar a gallon sale can get you a running QT suitable for most fish for less than $100.
It doesn't have to take up up much space. Think about where you will have to 'keep' a full tank of fish while treating them all for ich and keeping your main DT fishless to 72+ days. Now think about finding room for a 5 gallon bucket ......
If your wife will kill you for trying to setup a QT system, think how happy she will be when, after spending hundreds ( thousands? ) of dollars on equipment and livestock, she has to look at an empty tank for a few months while you purge it of ich.
Trust me, and all the others who have been there, YOUR LFS DOES NOT PROPERLY QT THEIR LIVESTOCK. If they could do it and still make money, they would all do so, but they can't. QT requires time and effort that a business just can't spend and still turn a profit.
It WILL happen to you. It's not a question of IF, just WHEN. It's Russian Roulette and each new fish is another empty chamber. If you think you are so much smarter than all the reefers who have come before you, I wish you the best of luck. If you want to PROVE you are smarter, listen those who have come before you and learn from their experiences.
:deadhorse: End of rant. :deadhorse:
This is an exciting time for you. Your research, reading, planning, saving and buying are finally coming together into the tank of your dreams. A little patch of ocean in your living room. Beautiful fish swimming peacefully among colorful corals and gracefully flowing anemones. You have spent months to get here and you are ready to stock your tank.
STOP! Did you set up a QT system?
I hate that every day when I get on RC, there is a new thread with the same old content about ich and lack of quarantine. It's sad and it makes me wonder if newcomers really read and learn, or just browse to validate their preconcieved notions. I'm heartbroken seeing folks face such huge disappointment early on when a few simple steps can prevent it. If you haven't already, go to the disease treatment forum and read. Or do a quick search here in the New to the Hobby section. There is an average of one new post per day about getting ich - in this forum alone! Anyone with any time in the hobby will likely have a story of how they lost a tankful of fish due to just one new arrival carrying asymptomatic ich. We have all learned our lesson, and a lot of us want to spare you the heartache by getting you to QT right from the start.
What's that you say?
All that DT equipment is so expensive, I can't afford an another setup.
I don't have room for another tank.
My wife will kill me.
My LFS quarantines all their fish.
It won't happen to me.
This is an expensive hobby. If you can afford a marine aquarium, you can afford a QT setup. It will not add much cost to your current investment and will certainly help protect that investment long term. The Petco dollar a gallon sale can get you a running QT suitable for most fish for less than $100.
It doesn't have to take up up much space. Think about where you will have to 'keep' a full tank of fish while treating them all for ich and keeping your main DT fishless to 72+ days. Now think about finding room for a 5 gallon bucket ......
If your wife will kill you for trying to setup a QT system, think how happy she will be when, after spending hundreds ( thousands? ) of dollars on equipment and livestock, she has to look at an empty tank for a few months while you purge it of ich.
Trust me, and all the others who have been there, YOUR LFS DOES NOT PROPERLY QT THEIR LIVESTOCK. If they could do it and still make money, they would all do so, but they can't. QT requires time and effort that a business just can't spend and still turn a profit.
It WILL happen to you. It's not a question of IF, just WHEN. It's Russian Roulette and each new fish is another empty chamber. If you think you are so much smarter than all the reefers who have come before you, I wish you the best of luck. If you want to PROVE you are smarter, listen those who have come before you and learn from their experiences.
:deadhorse: End of rant. :deadhorse:
