Do you have a build of how your scrubber works? Your diy seems very solid as well. As well, how you use the mud?
I use natural sea water too and by times add stuff I get at the beach.
Thank you this is good info, my attempts to trap or catch thses fish have since been futile. I will continue to try as my ultimate goal here would be a balance of the two worlds. I want strong healthy apropriatley fed fish, but also a tank free of disease.Immune fish are still afflicted by free swimming parasites, its just that their immune system excels at fighting them off. Most likely enzymes (or something similar) force the trophonts off the fish shortly after they begin feeding.
When you QT a fish and treat with copper (or CP), the chemical zaps the theronts (free swimming stage) before they ever have a chance to latch onto the fish and become trophonts. So in essence, you are eradicating ich from the tank itself - not treating the fish directly. Post treatment, the fish may still have immunity but it will no longer have ich. So nothing to pass on to other fish.
I also don't run carbon, GFO, abc, doh ray me, or any other abbreviations. You don't need it, it is un natural, may remove more good things than bad and it just makes me sad.
This may have been beat to death. However, especially in @Paul B case. He has never qt but surley has had a carrier fish in all his years introduced. Atleast it seems logical. So lets say he hasn't added a fish in years... is it possible the the imunity his fish have developed eradicated the disease, if the desease is deflected from the fish can it die off?. I know the imediate answer is no. And the fish still feed it to some level, but at what point can we say it is possible for the disease to die off. A fallow with fish if you will.
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I added 3 or 4 fish this year and 18,000 amphipods (I estimated)
My question would be lets say you hypothetically gave me a fish, and its been years since you bought one....and i transfered to my tank. Would the disease be tranfered to my tank that may have existed 5 years ago? I know there is no definitive answer here, but your theory is what im after. If a disease can die off in time from well kept immune fish such as yours.
This is going to be purely anecdotal but here goes
I have been watching this one Kole Tang over at my local Petco for weeks now. He looks flawless, has a very good appetite, swims normally, doesn't rub on rocks, etc. What makes this unusual is all his (fish) tankmates keep dying left & right. No physical evidence of velvet, but most of the dying fish have all the telltale behavioral symptoms: labored breathing, scratching/flashing, swimming into the flow of a powerhead, etc. What makes this a little tricky is I have gotten fish from this Petco with both velvet & brook, so without visible physical symptoms to go on its impossible to say which disease is in this tank. But I believe velvet because it's taking down even parasite resistant & hardy species such as wrasses, gobies... even all the damsels are dying.
Just wanted to share an interesting observation.
Agreed, the third fish is a blue damsel, also having a more thick slimecoat as well. I hear some damsel species other than clowns are capable of hostin nems due to this.
