Quarantine fish??

[Daniel korchick]

Hello,
I’ve had reef tanks before for years, but I’ve never actually quarantined my fish. Is it really something I should be doing?

 

[vetteguy53081]

Hello,
I’ve had reef tanks before for years, but I’ve never actually quarantined my fish. Is it really something I should be doing?

You really do want to Qt.
Quarantining a fish allows the fish to de-stress and for you to have the fish adjust to your parameters, your food while providing it a safe place for it to thrive away from more aggressive and established tank mates who can out compete it for food. Putting a fish directly into your display puts the fish into more stress after being netted at store or from shipment and added stress events leads to the reason why we quarantine our fish.
A fish’s immune system should be able to fight off more infections and diseases, however the shock of transportation compromises your fish’s immune system leaving it vulnerable to any disease that gets shipped with it. Some of these diseases when they break out can be so deadly, they can wipe our your tank within days.
Quarantine also allows you easy observation of new fish in case of disease as mentioned and reduces the cost of medication opposed to medicating an entire display tank.

 

[TastesLikeChicken]

Simple answer is yes. At first it still seem difficult. But the more you do it the easier it gets and it will eventually because a part of the hobby. And I highly recommend medicated quarantine.

 

[HuduVudu]

No, it is stressful for the fish. The treatment is worse than nothing. IME

Focus on eliminating stress factors in your tank to minimize the new fish's stress. This is a broad topic. Also work on getting the new fish on live foods.

 

[EeyoreIsMySpiritAnimal]

There are several recent threads on this topic. It might be worthwhile to look through those for advice and opinions

 

[Jeffcb]

I do not. Some do.

 

[LeftyReefer]

I learned my lesson. I QT now.