Hi, I guess you probably already did but in case you did not please check out the "How to Quarantine" thread, that has a wealth of info on proper procedure.
To answer your question I tend to do it for about 7 weeks:
- Week one: two rounds of Prazipro 7 days apart, followed by
- 4 weeks of observation and getting the fish fat, followed by
- Two weeks of copper (5 days to bring the concentration up and 9 days at full therapeautic dose)
At the end of this process you need to remove the fish from the QT and move them into either a new sterilized Hospital tank, or straight into your display.
Know, this is not your traditional 4 weeks of copper and only works if you remove your fish to another tank at the end of the copper process.
The reason why it works is related to the lifecycle of the parasite. During full copper dose free swimming parasites are killed by the copper in the water, so (theoretically) no new ones will attach to your fish. Also, the ones that ar attached to your fish will drop at the end of up to 7 days, and also be killed. This means that at the end of a 9 day (to be safe) full dose your fish should be parasite free. So by removing it at this time (without lowering the copper concentration) to a separate tank you should be parasite free. Remember however that in your QT there possibly are some Tomonts still encysted that have not hatched. The copper does not attack this stage so the QT may still be infected.after taking the fish out you can either just leave the tank running at full concentration for another 3 weeks, or empty it, sterilize it and get it ready again.
As I said, this is not the conventional method but it works well for me, with the advantages of
1- only subjecting the fish to 7-9 days of full concentration copper instead of 4-6 weeks. Copper is a poison;
2- it allows the fish to get fat before going through the copper
3- it also allows for another month of biological filter stabilization prior to copper.
If you have two separate QT, you can speed up the process with prazi (two rounds over two weeks), copper the next two weeks and immediately remove it to another sterilized QT for observation. You could in theory be done in just 4 weeks. However, I prefer my way so that the fish gets fat before copper. Also, in my e pertence it is best not to rush things. A good 7-8 week quarantine allows plenty of time for illness to manifest and taking it slowly also allows the fish to improve its health.
