Question about disease.

[tdbrown75]

If I had a disease in my tank, how long should I let it run without fish before its safe to add more? I suspect velvet, but I’m not positive. Fortunately, this happened in quarantine!

[kevin2000]

Since your dealing with a QT ... just tear down the tank .. rinse it with some diluted bleach water and let dry. Pretty std to tear down and clean each QT between use.

[tdbrown75]

Unfortunately it’s not really a traditional hospital type quarantine, as I use it to quarantine many things including inverts, corals, etc. It’s a 30 gallon tank and I use base rock as a biological filter, so I’m not so sure about bleaching it to start over.

I have done hypo, treated with antibiotics, and a number of other things over the years (no copper) and have never had any issues with this arrangement. Up until this latest disaster (only a few Chromis) I have not lost any fish in quarantine as a result.

I would really just like to wait it out if at all possible, that’s a lot less work then breaking the whole thing down and then trying to get it re-established and stable again.

[kevin2000]

I'm not sure there is a right answer for your question. When dealing with ich many would say that leaving your tank without fish for 5-6 weeks would insure that parasite would die off -- thats based on the life cycle of ich. Not sure whether that same time frame is appropriate for other diseases ... I dont know the specifics of the life cycle of amylo. Perhaps others have some insight.