The cons of quarantine

[reefwars]

Originally Posted by tim the toolman

I am also in the middle of setting up a qt for a vermiculated female leopard wrasse and I'm questioning wether its the right thing todo or not. I have never qtd a fish before and until now have had great luck (crossing fingers) I have just heard bad things about these guys being heavy carriers of parasites. I already have one full grown female in the tank and would like to make them a pair. Anyways that's my situation so I'll tag along this thread and hopefully it will help with my conundrum

in your situation i would look at:

how are my current fish doing?
what fish health problems have i had before in this tank?
how mature my tank is?


overall you can get a pretty darn good chance of survival if you pick out a relaxed but active, colorful leopard.look to see if its plump in the belly and that its colors are not faded or fins tore apart. eyes should look healthy and not faded.


if you find a good fish thats in good condition , and your tank is mature,stable and the current fish are healthy and have been healthy for a long time i wouldnt even second guess it ....i would acclimate and add straight to the tank.


from what ive noticed about leopards if their surroundings dont have what they require they are unsettled and paranoid , they dash about and swim up high.

when they have lots of sand around and plenty of food to hunt for they
are a carefree fish , pretty peaceful and graceful.


thats my take on leopards and most other wrasses......they love to hunt if they cant find any food when they hunt they start to panic and they have a stressed look about them....why wouldnt they though right??

[tim the toolman]

My tank is about a year and a half old with a good pod colony and have never dealt with any illness in the tank ever. I just worry when I read about others adding a fish and ending up losing all livestock. I know this is a rarity but it is still something I consider.

Also I ordered the fish from the same lfs that my first leopard came from so selection of the specimen will not be an option. I usually would not go this route but this specific fish can be hard to locate and the other stores around that did get them in I was never happy with the condition they arrived in. (3 of 5 doa) once and I bought 2 another time when they were new arrivals and asked the store to hold them for a week to be sure and they both died.

[Aquattro]

Originally Posted by tim the toolman

I know this is a rarity but it is still something I consider.

Don't fool yourself. I received lots of PMs from people that had this happen, they'd just never posted. Some people feel that they'll look dumb or something if they admit to being careless and kill their entire tank. A lot more people do this than post about it.

[tim the toolman]

Ive got the sand and tank running already and have close to 25 spare pounds of live rock in my sump so I think that having it all running together for the next 2 weeks before the fish arrives I should be ok. The fish was just ordered today. I also have a huge caulerpa colony in my fugue so I should be able to seed the tank with a bunch of pods ahead of time. I also brew my own photo and baby brine so I should be able to provide a good diet to start her off as well.

[tim the toolman]

Originally Posted by Aquattro

Don't fool yourself. I received lots of PMs from people that had this happen, they'd just never posted. Some people feel that they'll look dumb or something if they admit to being careless and kill their entire tank. A lot more people do this than post about it.

That's good to hear then. I think that sorta concretes my wants for a good qt

[Aquattro]

Originally Posted by reefwars

if you find a good fish thats in good condition , and your tank is mature,stable and the current fish are healthy and have been healthy for a long time i wouldnt even second guess it ....i would acclimate and add straight to the tank.

Exact process I used for the last fish I bought. It killed everything.

Although I was tempted to just add it(wrasse), I had to remember the three days it took to kill all 12 or so of my prized fish. I added a perfectly healthy looking fish, but looks aren't everything.
Adding that one last fish to your tank and finding that it carries Marine Velvet is a sad way to finish off your stocking list.

The lesson I learned with this wrasse was to have a QT up and running properly before getting it. If you're not ready yet, wait on this one and order one when you are ready.

[reefwars]

Originally Posted by Aquattro

Exact process I used for the last fish I bought. It killed everything.

Although I was tempted to just add it(wrasse), I had to remember the three days it took to kill all 12 or so of my prized fish. I added a perfectly healthy looking fish, but looks aren't everything.
Adding that one last fish to your tank and finding that it carries Marine Velvet is a sad way to finish off your stocking list.

The lesson I learned with this wrasse was to have a QT up and running properly before getting it. If you're not ready yet, wait on this one and order one when you are ready.

i know where your coming from it only takes that one time yes and i agree im not saying qt is bad im actually all for it , but i do choose going by species sometimes whether to qt or not.

how many fish have you had you estimate since you started reefing??

im sure if there are average a dozen fish in every tank and since youve been reefing a decade or more i bet youve had several tanks so lets say i which i bet is even a low number...umm 50 fish....in your case thats 1/50 in 10yrs , someone else may go 1 in 5 .

i guess its like poker you look at your hand count your chips and either go all in or fold

for certain wrasses im not with qt, id rather play the hand and go all in

[reefermadness]

Originally Posted by Aquattro

Agreed. It segregates the fish from the general population, which might help it settle in, but does nothing for disease management.

The idea stems from the fact that unless you have a completely separate system where water quality is just as good as the display than you are putting the fish under even more undue stress. And even if you have a separate system you have to be careful what meds you add to the system that might effect water quality.

The biggest thing is to keep the fish in segregation to allow it a place to acclimate to aquaria without stressful tank mates competing for food. Once you have this fish adapted to captive life and nice and fat it sure has a better chance in the display.

Also most of us try to buy fish with no apparent sickness. If something does pop up on it you can take the tank offline at the first sign....vastly reducing the chance of it getting transmitted to the display. At this point you can do what ever you have to do to the QT to get the fish healthy.

Really I think a fat and healthy eating fish is in most cases a healthy one and this is the number one thing we struggle with once we add a new specimen to the display (lack of eating and shyness or all out aggression from others).

And lets admit it...how many of us are going to set up a quality system just as good (in terms of water quality) as the display, just for the odd time we are adding a fish? I can see you didnt Brad, but dont feel bad...that is the norm (I've heard this story quite a bit) and where most people fail with QT. Ya two equal systems is the ideal....but not too many people have the ambition, funds or space to do that. My idea is a close second.

[Reef Pilot]

Even after QT, I had an ich outbreak this summer. I had bought some new fish and a couple conch snails a couple months before and put them all in my QT tank for a month. Everyone looked good, fishing eating well, so I added them to my display tank.

About a month after that, I noticed some scratching and flashing with a couple of my fish. Unfortunately, I was away a lot this summer, and not in a good position to fight the disease in the best way possible. Most of my fish caught the ich, and two ended up dying (my long lived Copperband, and a Royal Gramma). Ironically, none of the new fish died or even displayed symptoms. Also, I have a very old Yellow Tang (10+ years) that did not show any symptoms either. I thought they were supposed to be more susceptible, but obviously not this one.

Thankfully now, my tank has recovered and all the fish are fine. I have some other butterfly fish (Pearlescales) that had it pretty bad, and thought I might lose them, but they also pulled through. The infected fish never did stop feeding, and I think that helped them fight the disease.

In the past, when I QT'ed new fish, I put them through the hyposalinity routine, with 100% success. This time because I had the conch snails, I couldn't do that. Obviously, the new fish (gobies) were carriers, even though they didn't show symptoms in the QT.

Anyway, another lesson for me. Despite all my past preaching about QT, I still got caught. I guess I will just have to be more careful. And summer, or late spring, is not a good time for me to acquire any new livestock.