Sk8r
11/10/2014, 11:16 AM
Quarantine is effective at protecting your tank...but...
What not to do:
1. having a fish in qt, spotting another you want two weeks on, and adding him to the qt---without re-setting the clock, ie, starting over. There are many fish in the sea. Wait. Ask your lfs to put one into the order when you're ready.
2. not jump-guarding the qt.
3a. treating every new fish with copper. Copper is a difficult med to manage without an autotopoff to manage topoff by tablespoons of fresh water. It's toxic, so it's not going to help your fish's overall health: it works by killing parasites faster than it kills fish. Some stores use it. I won't buy fish from them. This is personal opinion. Your mileage may vary.
3b. If your fish turns up with a bacterial infection which requires antibiotics, you have to take a day to completely rid the tank and equipment of copper before dosing antibiotic.
3c.My personal opinion of it is...I don't use it even on sick fish.
3d.And if you have a cycled qt, the copper kills off your bacteria.
4. rushing. The problem may not manifest early on: the fish arrives on his version of an adrenaline high---but he may show a problem three or four days or even a week or so after he calms down. You also don't know WHEN he was exposed. Could have been the very day you bought him, and things take their own time developing.
5. using nets, wet hands, and what-not between tanks, like your dt and qt. Yep. Li'l drops of water. Don't do that. Dry off. Use different gear.
6. Using a cycled vs an uncycled [obsessively cleaned] qt is equally successful, well managed. Well-managed is the key. Don't let your salinity, temperature, or water quality bounce around. If you are using tank-transfer, uncycled: you certainly don't want a cycled sponge traveling with your fish: ich's life cycle requires it to leave the fish and lodge in the environment to grow, then reinfest. When you transfer tanks, you should leave everything behind.
7. sand and rock and permanent filter media in a tank where you may be fighting ich. See 6. And 3d.
Your preferred method of qt may vary because of the type of fishes you want to keep.
Exceptions? if your fish is a specialized feeder (like a mandy) that can't feed in qt, you're going to have to grit your teeth and buy pods for him: he eats a bottle a day....or grit your teeth and put him in without quarantine. I choose the latter, since a healthy mandy has a slime coat so incredibly thick that ich has a real hard time penetrating it: they can't get it unless they're in such bad health or have been in such rotten conditions that their slime coat is shot. If you don't want to either feed him pods or put him straight in, don't buy a mandarin or scooter that you haven't personally seen eat pellet.
And if qt'ing a wrasse that sleeps in sand? You may need to provide him a small dish of sand.
QT is not an easy period. Study it and make your choices while you're cycling. There's a lot to learn. Study fish diseases: look up pictures of the diseases so you can recognize them if they appear. Your correct diagnosis is vital if you're going to treat, because the bad problems progress very fast.
HTH.
What not to do:
1. having a fish in qt, spotting another you want two weeks on, and adding him to the qt---without re-setting the clock, ie, starting over. There are many fish in the sea. Wait. Ask your lfs to put one into the order when you're ready.
2. not jump-guarding the qt.
3a. treating every new fish with copper. Copper is a difficult med to manage without an autotopoff to manage topoff by tablespoons of fresh water. It's toxic, so it's not going to help your fish's overall health: it works by killing parasites faster than it kills fish. Some stores use it. I won't buy fish from them. This is personal opinion. Your mileage may vary.
3b. If your fish turns up with a bacterial infection which requires antibiotics, you have to take a day to completely rid the tank and equipment of copper before dosing antibiotic.
3c.My personal opinion of it is...I don't use it even on sick fish.
3d.And if you have a cycled qt, the copper kills off your bacteria.
4. rushing. The problem may not manifest early on: the fish arrives on his version of an adrenaline high---but he may show a problem three or four days or even a week or so after he calms down. You also don't know WHEN he was exposed. Could have been the very day you bought him, and things take their own time developing.
5. using nets, wet hands, and what-not between tanks, like your dt and qt. Yep. Li'l drops of water. Don't do that. Dry off. Use different gear.
6. Using a cycled vs an uncycled [obsessively cleaned] qt is equally successful, well managed. Well-managed is the key. Don't let your salinity, temperature, or water quality bounce around. If you are using tank-transfer, uncycled: you certainly don't want a cycled sponge traveling with your fish: ich's life cycle requires it to leave the fish and lodge in the environment to grow, then reinfest. When you transfer tanks, you should leave everything behind.
7. sand and rock and permanent filter media in a tank where you may be fighting ich. See 6. And 3d.
Your preferred method of qt may vary because of the type of fishes you want to keep.
Exceptions? if your fish is a specialized feeder (like a mandy) that can't feed in qt, you're going to have to grit your teeth and buy pods for him: he eats a bottle a day....or grit your teeth and put him in without quarantine. I choose the latter, since a healthy mandy has a slime coat so incredibly thick that ich has a real hard time penetrating it: they can't get it unless they're in such bad health or have been in such rotten conditions that their slime coat is shot. If you don't want to either feed him pods or put him straight in, don't buy a mandarin or scooter that you haven't personally seen eat pellet.
And if qt'ing a wrasse that sleeps in sand? You may need to provide him a small dish of sand.
QT is not an easy period. Study it and make your choices while you're cycling. There's a lot to learn. Study fish diseases: look up pictures of the diseases so you can recognize them if they appear. Your correct diagnosis is vital if you're going to treat, because the bad problems progress very fast.
HTH.