is quarantining necessary?

[drblakjak55]

QT everything if you like what’s in the big tank. One bad experience that can be avoided. I have a 29g biocube running continuously as a frag tank and QT. Whole thing with black box light I cut the top for cost 200$. Everything goes there for six weeks. Fish get strong eating new diet not getting picked on. Corals get observed closely. I’ve never medicated and some fairly sick fish have come back. Two wrasses and a pair of clowns live permanently in QT may someday act as early disease detectors.
so QT or not: up to you (an excuse to buy a second tank)(avoid disaster).

 

[MnFish1]

Direct quote from you about adding directly to the display tank.

Unorthodox ways to do things

www.thereeftank.com

IMHO - this is a non-winnable or even discussable 'discussion'. So many things have been said, rephrased, etc even over the last month. That there will always be a post saying x (while ignoring post y - which says the opposite). If you criticise post y, Post x will be cited. If you criticize Post x, post Y will be cited.

 

[MnFish1]

QT everything if you like what’s in the big tank. One bad experience that can be avoided. I have a 29g biocube running continuously as a frag tank and QT. Whole thing with black box light I cut the top for cost 200$. Everything goes there for six weeks. Fish get strong eating new diet not getting picked on. Corals get observed closely. I’ve never medicated and some fairly sick fish have come back. Two wrasses and a pair of clowns live permanently in QT may someday act as early disease detectors.
so QT or not: up to you (an excuse to buy a second tank)(avoid disaster).

question, lets say you've put 25 fish in the tank over the years. If the 'rumors' of a vastly contaminated supply chain are true, I would expect you would at least see many fish that develop disease or 2 many deaths. What percent (approx) of your fish develop signs of disease and what percent die? How many make it through without any medication. If a fish gets sick, do you medicate it?

 

[cryptodendrum]

No one quarantines until they’re stung by velvet and lose everything, then everyone changes their minds

Including me

Some don't. I had a neighbour who was also into reefing for about 15 years. He refused to make this learning jump, and just kept restocking his tank, until he got so frustrated and worn out from it, he just quit the hobby (just 5 months ago, too.)

 

[MnFish1]

I posted a poll about observation only quarantine - to get an idea about what people are doing - if you're interested:

Observation Quarantine - worth it or not?

So lots of discussion about "QT" lately. For this poll, QT = Observation in a separate tank from the display - with no prophylactic treatment. Note there is a choice to pick "I don't use Observation only QT', and also 'I use QT with prophylactic treatment". This will give an idea as to what...

www.reef2reef.com

 

[Paul B]

I just re read that Clorox thing and I do and did advocate it into your tank to eliminate ich, bristle worms and everything else and you can leave that Clorox in your tank which I have done a couple of things in the beginning.

Of course this is where there are no fish that you want to keep and not have a nice clean scent. But you have to remove the chlorine before you add the fish.

Again Robert Straughn and it works great if you want to keep that old water.

 

[Lost in the Sauce]

Are we sure everyone here understands how vaccines work....

Right.......

 

[zalick]

...

Yes I can. When I get a sick fish for free or some other way like my last copperband I put it in a spare tank with real hiding places using red bricks like they use for building houses. Not PVC and not coral rock.

I add the proper amount of copper. I use stuff that was made in Brooklyn in the 70s and it also has formalin in it.
because thats the only bottle of copper I ever bought.



I put in my diatom filter which will remove any parasites that fall off the fish. I will leave the fish in there for about ten days or a little less. If I have quinicrine hydrocloride I will add that with the copper. Again, I didn't discover that. (but I invented mixing them, I think) It is in one of my fish disease books and as a malaria medication it interrupts the life cycle of the paracite at a different point than copper. At least thats what I got out of it as I am an electrician, not a doctor but I can say it works very fast. It is a prescription medication and I can't get it any more as I used to know the pharmacist.

I can find you the dosage if you are interested.

Thank you very much for posting this! Extremely helpful.

Anyone is welcome to come to my house on Long Island and we can talk fish and I can show my method. I have been invited to speak on this at 3 aquarium societies in different places in the US.

As a fellow boater and fisherman I’d love to take you up on this next time I’m out on the east coast. I’m heading out now to go fishing in the beautiful 80 degree weather we have in Oregon.

 

[ReefRxSWFL]

I know there are tons of opinions on quarantining and not quarantining saltwater fish, but i wonder if it is really necessary to quarantine. I would rather not, because im on a tight budget, but if its absolutely necessary, i'll go for it. Thanks for your help

Best Practice Quarantine costs about 100$ for everything you need, including the Hanna Copper checker. Beaides the emotional loss, do you have $100 in fish you can live with losing?

 

[Futuretotm]

Best Practice Quarantine costs about 100$ for everything you need, including the Hanna Copper checker. Beaides the emotional loss, do you have $100 in fish you can live with losing?

Perhaps shouldn’t jump into a hobby with a tight budget. I am sorry, but we have responsibilities to fish as well.

Kinda like I’m on a tight budget so can’t really fix the dogs hip, let’s just take him out back and shoot him in the head.

I am also guilty of this, was lazy more so, just plop this fish in and feed a variety of foods and all will be well like paulb tank…. Had 28 fish, hippo went in last, velvet, 6 survived…. Never again

 

[cryptodendrum]

Best Practice Quarantine costs about 100$ for everything you need, including the Hanna Copper checker. Beaides the emotional loss, do you have $100 in fish you can live with losing?

100% what you say, and why I was advocating for real Risk Management on this topic. If someone's got 3-4 damsels and that's it, Ich away if cost overheads are important. But if someone has a large tank like me, or even better... a large network of interconnected tanks like me.... QT is the most sustainable approach.

BTW, this is what my QT setup looks like:

2 x 10L Glass tanks
And old AquaMedic 4CH autodoser for automatic water changes (you can buy these for like 25-50 euros second hand, but cheap brand new ones are only 100-ish now from other vendors these days.)
2 x 25w heaters
2 x micro powerheads
2 x water level float valves (to cut off dosers if something goes wrong) hooked up to my RaspberryPi based Aquarium controller
10 Watt Dennerale LED light (for corals) @ 6000K
2x 3 Watt Superfish LED light (corals) @ 9000K

And optionally, for fish, Seneye for NH3 monitoring, which plugs into my RaspberryPi directly (No Windows/SWS needed).

That's it. Cheap. Easy. Automatic.

BTW, used glass is cheap and free. Since I setup my QT, I've come across multiple "free" aquariums, ranging from 29L to 60L - total of 5, and a brand new 90L plastic tub. They all sit in my garden shed ready to grab if I ever need to quarantine big fish or a multiple fish/corals at once.

To me, risking an outbreak in my main system of multiple tanks would be very laborious and $$$$, more than QTing.

 

[Futuretotm]

My ultra cheap QT for small fish only

2x 5 gallon buckets of my salt mix
Bubbler
Netting to cover above buckets
Near window for light
Biospira

I use hybrid ttm

 

[Squidward]

I guess my question related more to what you 'would' do if you got a disease in your system. BTW - again what you're implying is that most of the time fish that you buy do not have any disease in the first place - if you've only had one chromic die of uronema.

I would be devastated if I ever got velvet again. It would be the fallow and copper route. Which I hope I never have to do. 90% of my fish were from online order. Thankfully the majority came in decent shape with no visible signs of parasites etc. And I make sure I pick healthy fish from the LFS and still do TTM on them.

 

[cryptodendrum]

buckets

I can remember when it was first proposed to me to setup a QT tank on ReefCentral back in 2003-2004.
I remember very well, my head exploding with this thought : "Another second aquarium? what the heck am I going to put it?"

Because in my head, I was seeing just that - a second aquarium the same size as the one I'd just adopted. And all the pumps, heaters, filtration system, etc that goes with it.

If someone said "nah, dude, make a QT from a 45L mixing bucket, that's food safe. You can buy them for 5 euros. 6 weeks later, take it all away" - I think I might have avoided the mental shock myself.

This is why today, I try to explain to people, my entire primary QT (of two 10L tanks, autodoser, etc.) setup, takes the space of two shoeboxes (maybe three, if they are small shoes) side to side. It literally sits on top of a shallow depth Ikea bakers rack, which I use to store all my other fish supplies.

Buckets are also 100% perfectly usable. I've breed and raised Seahorse fry in recycled salt buckets now, totally usable for QTs.

 

[ReefRxSWFL]

Best Practice Quarantine costs about 100$ for everything you need, including the Hanna Copper checker. Beaides the emotional loss, do you have $100 in fish you can live with losing?

100% what you say, and why I was advocating for real Risk Management on this topic. If someone's got 3-4 damsels and that's it, Ich away if cost overheads are important. But if someone has a large tank like me, or even better... a large network of interconnected tanks like me.... QT is the most sustainable approach.

BTW, this is what my QT setup looks like:

2 x 10L Glass tanks
And old AquaMedic 4CH autodoser for automatic water changes (you can buy these for like 25-50 euros second hand, but cheap brand new ones are only 100-ish now from other vendors these days.)
2 x 25w heaters
2 x micro powerheads
2 x water level float valves (to cut off dosers if something goes wrong) hooked up to my RaspberryPi based Aquarium controller
10 Watt Dennerale LED light (for corals) @ 6000K
2x 3 Watt Superfish LED light (corals) @ 9000K

And optionally, for fish, Seneye for NH3 monitoring, which plugs into my RaspberryPi directly (No Windows/SWS needed).

That's it. Cheap. Easy. Automatic.

BTW, used glass is cheap and free. Since I setup my QT, I've come across multiple "free" aquariums, ranging from 29L to 60L - total of 5, and a brand new 90L plastic tub. They all sit in my garden shed ready to grab if I ever need to quarantine big fish or a multiple fish/corals at once.

To me, risking an outbreak in my main system of multiple tanks would be very laborious and $$$$, more than QTing.

Im amazed anyone can come out adamantly against quarantine. Thats plain disrespectful of the animals you chose to take the responsibility of their health and well being into your hands.

 

[Jekyl]

Im amazed anyone can come out adamantly against quarantine. Thats plain disrespectful of the animals you chose to take the responsibility of their health and well being into your hands.

I don't have an issue with quarantine. I don't like the idea of treatment before diagnosis.

 

[Futuretotm]

I don't have an issue with quarantine. I don't like the idea of treatment before diagnosis.

Do your new fish write down diagnosis upon purchase?

 

[MnFish1]

Do your new fish write down diagnosis upon purchase?

You seem to miss the point. If you read the polls MOST people do not do anything - and they are fine. To me this suggests that MOST people don't need to QT - BUT if you observe the fish and they become sick, you treat them to me thats a happy compromise. There are plenty of protocols - some more or less stringent.

 

[BlackGoldReefs]

I know there are tons of opinions on quarantining and not quarantining saltwater fish, but i wonder if it is really necessary to quarantine. I would rather not, because im on a tight budget, but if its absolutely necessary, i'll go for it. Thanks for your help

If your on a budget it’s a must. You will be devastated when all your fish is gone by one bad apple. Believe in the long run you will be money ahead. This is from experience, I lost every fish in my tank due to one addition from a big box pet store. It ended up costing thousands to correct any restock.

 

[Kershaw]

This is not true, unless I'm misunderstanding what you mean. 1. What is your definition of 'QT', medication? length? observation? Coral/Fish/inverts (some or all)?
2. A QT tank is not 'sterile'. It (should be) pathogen free. Putting a fish in TTM, or an observation tank, does nothing to its 'immune system', unless you are keeping it there for months perhaps. Even with copper, the tank is not sterile, and the fish's 'biome' is not completely wrecked, and the immune system is 'not destroyed'. There are multiple layers to a fish's immune system. One of the most important is just the coating of slime on the skin which contains multiple chemicals that kill parasites and bacteria.

To me it all comes down to the logic of the 'discussion'. Why did the world attempt to eliminate small pox? By some of the logic here, it seems like that would be a negative. How about malaria, tapeworms, syphilis, gonorrhea, HIV, cholera, etc etc - I don't know of many scientists that suggest that its a good idea that everyone be exposed to these things to 'boost their immune systems'. So to me - there is logic to QT of some sort (I do not personally like prophylactic medication). There are also people that do nothing that are successful. I don't see it as a black and white issue, but rather, as @brandon429 has suggested, I would like to have a better explanation of 'why' one or the other method works. A lot of the 'logic' I read about natural tanks does not make sense (to me).

I should have spent more time on my post to clarify. To me it appears when most not all, talk about QT it sounds sterile. I have never QT any fish but I have always wanted to try it. Always been to scared and I never really lost many fish. I had a blue tang that showed ich one time and then never again. Had him for 3 years before I sold him to fish store because he would kill new additions.

I strongly believe QT is good to prevent some things but I also strongly believe that exposing fish to something can immune them to it. So I am trying to figure out what I will do with my new tank as it is a few months away from running. I will most likely do some type of hybrid QT/ no QT method.

I just want people to be willing to look at both sides with the attitude to be open minded. Not to prove others wrong. I feel like there are people who wait for Paul or Brandon to post just so they can try and get a gotcha moment. Alright enough of my rant. I’m to tired to get caught up tonight but will finish reading this thread tomorrow.