Coming up with a quarantine protocol

[Averhoeven]

I have my first few fish for my new tank coming in in a couple days so I'm trying to get my quarantine protocol ironed out and I had a couple things I couldn't decide on. My plan is to write the "schedule" on the tank (20 long) with a permanent marker so I can then just fill in the blanks with actual dates with a whiteboard marker.
My hypothesized plan is :
Eating for 2-3 days
Prazi 1 and metronidazole
Water change
Prazi 2 (5 days after 1st dose)
Water change
Observe for 30 more days with copper or hypo

My questions are, should I dose copper for the 30 days, go hypo (and to what, 1.009?) or do both (too stressful?)? Should i separate out the metro and prazi? Any other thoughts, questions or advice? I can't really do TTM... I've already gotten a frag/coral QT and this QT past the wife. Adding another tank and more work/"water changes" likely won't fly.

Thank you

 

[Big G]

Welcome to R2R! Lots of very kind and helpful people here. Here's my QT treatment plan. Hope this helps a bit.

Here's my prophylactic treatment for all incoming fish that are not showing any disease or injuries. Marine velvet is rampant in the industry these days, so I get to treating with copper (Copper Power) ASAP. The darned suppliers, shippers and LFS are frequently treating fish with sub-therapeutic levels of copper to keep fish alive and looking the best for sale. But the sub-therapeutic levels wear off rather quickly once you get the fish home and then velvet comes roaring back almost without warning from the usual symptoms. So be aware of difficult breathing, hiding from light, swimming into powerheads, etc.:

Prophylactic Treatment: No observed symptoms of disease or injury

20 gal QT cycled: HOB with foam pad & BioMax treated with Bio Spira/Dr Tims, foam bubble filter with foam soaked for at least 2 weeks in DT sump, heater, powerhead, Seachem Ammonia Alert Badge.
Tank lights off. Ambient room lighting only.
Feed fish with white/black worms, vitamin & fiber packed frozen food with Selcon/Zoecon for at least 3 days
Freshwater dip to check for flukes
S-l-o-w-l-y (8-10 days) bring up copper to therapeutic levels for prophylactic treatment for 30 days: Tank lights off until therapeutic level is reached. Best to dose several times a day (AM, lunch, PM) rather than one large dose.
Carbon & Cuprisorb to remove copper. Water changes. Observe.
General Cure 2 doses 5-7 days apart. Turn up bubbler and turn on powerhead aimed at surface to increase O2. Like GC over Prazipro. GC has Metro + Praziquantel, so you are getting the Praziquantel which kills flukes and "some" internal parasites and Metro that kills all internal parasites/worms. And the dose of Praziquantel is lower but does the job and is easier on sensitive fish.
Carbon & water changes.
Observe 10-14 days.

 

[Averhoeven]

Welcome to R2R! Lots of very kind and helpful people here. Here's my QT treatment plan. Hope this helps a bit.

Here's my prophylactic treatment for all incoming fish that are not showing any disease or injuries. Marine velvet is rampant in the industry these days, so I get to treating with copper (Copper Power) ASAP. The darned suppliers, shippers and LFS are frequently treating fish with sub-therapeutic levels of copper to keep fish alive and looking the best for sale. But the sub-therapeutic levels wear off rather quickly once you get the fish home and then velvet comes roaring back almost without warning from the usual symptoms. So be aware of difficult breathing, hiding from light, swimming into powerheads, etc.:

Prophylactic Treatment: No observed symptoms of disease or injury

20 gal QT cycled: HOB with foam pad & BioMax treated with Bio Spira/Dr Tims, foam bubble filter with foam soaked for at least 2 weeks in DT sump, heater, powerhead, Seachem Ammonia Alert Badge.
Tank lights off. Ambient room lighting only.
Feed fish with white/black worms, vitamin & fiber packed frozen food with Selcon/Zoecon for at least 3 days
Freshwater dip to check for flukes
S-l-o-w-l-y (8-10 days) bring up copper to therapeutic levels for prophylactic treatment for 30 days: Tank lights off until therapeutic level is reached. Best to dose several times a day (AM, lunch, PM) rather than one large dose.
Carbon & Cuprisorb to remove copper. Water changes. Observe.
General Cure 2 doses 5-7 days apart. Turn up bubbler and turn on powerhead aimed at surface to increase O2. Like GC over Prazipro. GC has Metro + Praziquantel, so you are getting the Praziquantel which kills flukes and "some" internal parasites and Metro that kills all internal parasites/worms. And the dose of Praziquantel is lower but does the job and is easier on sensitive fish.
Carbon & water changes.
Observe 10-14 days.

Thanks, I appreciate that. Just trying to get it all set in my head before they get here. I've got an Aquaclear 70 Hob, heater, PVC piping and the ammonia badge ready to roll already.
So reading that, you copper for 30 days then prazi/metro? Any reason not to dip and Prazi first? Particularly, why not dip prior to transfer to the QT from the bag instead of after they're eating? Too much stress initially? How long do you dip for?
Also, any benefit to maintaining hyposalinity as well during 30 days of copper or is that tool much and should just do the copper?
I've already got the Prazi and metro as separates but I'll keep the GC in mind for the future when they run out.
Thanks a lot.

 

[Big G]

I used to treat with General Cure first, but this sub-therapeutic treatment of copper by the suppliers caused me to lose a whole QT full of fish to velvet. So knowing this I switched to copper first. Works pretty good and have not lost a fish in QT since. Yeah!
Some do freshwater dip right out of the shipping bag. But it seems a bit rough on the fish to me. I do the standard 5 minute freshwater dip.
Great question about the hypo. Most of fish I seem to be getting these days are being shipped at around 1.015-6. So I raise it up a bit to just under 1.o20 while dosing Copper Power. And I keep it there until the copper and GC is done and I am observing after all meds have been removed, then raising it to 1.025/6 same as my DT.
Really like GC. The praziquantel dosage is lower than the prescribed liquid by PraziPro. It's easier on fish, especially sensitive fish like puffers, wrasses, anthias, etc. yet it does the job quite nicely.

 

[ruppertb]

Interested in this as well. I need a good qt bible so to speak. Step by step what do do day by day. And some if statements as far as if this is observed do this and so on. Anyone have one of these written up for themselves they would share.

 

[werdona]

After the copper treatment you remove the copper using cuprisorp but leave the fish in the same QT tank. The fish should be clear of white spot/velvet parisites but are you concerned that some of the white spot Tomonts may not have hatched yet. Humblefish points out that 45 days or 72 days is possible in the extreme.

 

[JRAD]

Does the general cure get dosed in the h20? If so does it tx internal and external parasites? Does metronidazole need to be eaten to cure internal parasites/worms?