What percentage of your new live stock has caused a quarantine tank sterilization?

[paulhr]

I am new to the hobby and am doing it correctly with a quarantine tank. I am just wondering how often have people had to sterilize the QT because new live stock got sick/died. I have put some dry rock and sand, copepods and snails in the QT. I am taking this pole to get some sense of how much risk I am taking that I will have to dispose of the rock, sand, copepods and snails.

[immortl]

There may well be several opinions, but my understanding and routine I use is to not have anything like sand, rock, snails, in the quarantine tank. Sand would continue to propagate things such as ich, and treatments such as copper would kill off the snails.

I go with a bare bottom with a few pieces of PVC pipe and elbows for cover for the fish. Based on what I have read, this seems to be the accepted norm.

Thanks,
Joe

[paulhr]

Originally Posted by immortl

There may well be several opinions, but my understanding and routine I use is to not have anything like sand, rock, snails, in the quarantine tank. Sand would continue to propagate things such as ich, and treatments such as copper would kill off the snails.

I go with a bare bottom with a few pieces of PVC pipe and elbows for cover for the fish. Based on what I have read, this seems to be the accepted norm.

Thanks,
Joe

Yes, I have read that too. But, the implicit assumption is that you will have to dispose of everything so often that you take the route of bare bottom. I just have not seen any percentage numbers to back that up. I am looking for real world percentage number to back up or challenge that " implicit assumption "

[ReefPharmer]

The reason for the barebones qt is not because you have to sterilize it as you note. Most people do not run a full time qt w no fish in it. Instead they keep it dry until needed. To avoid ammonia spikes, I have a seeded sponge filter or three in my dt sump so when I need a qt, I use one sponge filter w a air pump. If you are treating your old fish, you can even take old water from dt to avoid shock. When not in use, break it down.

[ca1ore]

There are different kinds of quarantine tanks: those used for observation and those used for actual treatment. If you can swing it, I think both have their place. For example, I have a 30L setup as a more or less complete reef tank. I use this tank to QT all new inverts and to observe any new fish, and it has sand, live rock, etc., but it never sees medications. If a fish proves to be diseased, I remove it to a 20L hospital tank that is setup as needed. It is completely bare except for a few pices of 2" PVC. I keep a few bags of de-nitrate in my DT sump to use as biological filtration as needed. Nothing from the hospital tank ever goes back into either my main display or the observation tank. If a fish has had a disease in the observation tank, I then leave it fallow for 12 weeks.

I would estimate that about one in every five fish has required some kind of hospital stay and thus subsequent sterilization of the tank. Currently I have a purple tang in their for ich. I don't anticipate any further fish for a while so I may just empty it and let it just dry out. A few months ago I had a flame angel in there that died very quickly of what I now suspect may have been velvet, but I got the cupramine in there too late (and flames don't tolerate copper all that well). I sterilized with bleach after that.

[hogfanreefer]

I understood the reason to avoid sand/rock was that it made it much more difficult to get the correct levels of meds (like copper). I've started treating all new fish with copper unless it's a fish that's sensitive to copper.

[mikecc67548]

I "sterilize" after every use.

[Gbear]

I have some rock in mine. It helps the fish feel more at ease IMO.
I will run fallow if I suspect issues.
You can also run real low or high salinity if you want to try and kill off something.

You need to do a bit of research to determine it it is worth while doing so.
Good question.

[R.W.]

Originally Posted by ReefPharmer

The reason for the barebones qt is not because you have to sterilize it as you note. Most people do not run a full time qt w no fish in it. Instead they keep it dry until needed. To avoid ammonia spikes, I have a seeded sponge filter or three in my dt sump so when I need a qt, I use one sponge filter w a air pump. If you are treating your old fish, you can even take old water from dt to avoid shock. When not in use, break it down.

Exactly. You must also understand that even under observation for several weeks-months you cannot determine if the fish is completely free on any parasite/infection/virus. I treat prophylactically with 4-8 weeks of copper and 2 rounds of prazi-pro on every new fish to eliminate as much as possible. When they have an illness not treated by those two I will treat accordingly. This is why you want to have a bare tank with pvc because they are easily sterilized after every use and don't absorb medications. The observation method (only treating when an illness is observed) is simply not adequate in guaranteeing your fish are healthy. There is thousands of dollars in your fish tank, why not take the extra time to make sure that investment is protected.

R.W.

[MellowReefer]

When I first set up a QT, like you I wanted a natural looking tank with rocks and sand because the only place I had for it was my living room and I wanted it to look nice. I also wanted the fish to have a natural environment. I did not treat prophylactically, just observed for 4 weeks. You can guess where this is going, after my last fish addition my tank broke out in ich. I had to remove all fish and treat with copper anyway, this time in a larger bare-bottom QT like I should have done in the first place. You can have a pretty QT for inverts/corals but for fish you want bare-bottom and treat every fish for ich with cupramine or tank transfer (IMO).

[Kyle918]

I would say that it more depends on the type of fish you purchase. Tangs are just more prone to have ich than say a madarin.

I would though, stick to tried and proven methods for QT to save yourself trouble in the long run. The fish don't need all for the purpose you are trying to accomplish. The reason people advise to have a stripped down tank is because that is what we have found over the last 10, 20, 30 years...to work best. I'm not saying you have too do it this way but there is no sense in reinventing the wheel. You can do whatever you want to the wheel but it works best when round...