How to Quarantine

[Enigma]

I have a 30 gallon QT and a 33 gallon QT. Plus, I have a 12 gallon Nano Cube that I can use for a QT. The 30s are stacked one over the other on a metal stand in my laundry room. I use 36" two bulb T5 fixtures over both: one hangs from the ceiling and the other sits on the bottom tank.

For filtration, I have a Fluval 305 canister filter that is filled with Matrix, and I also have a Marineland Emperor 280 biowheel filter which gets filled with Matrix. The Matrix and the biowheel are stored in the sump of my display system when my QT isn't in use: to keep them seeded with bacteria.

I run an airstone, and whatever heaters and powerheads I find laying around. I generally keep the QT lower flow.

I dose prophylactically with ParaGuard (four weeks) and Prazi-Pro (two weeks). Also, depending on what medication I'm using, I dose Prime regularly. I check ammonia twice a day. That's all I check. I typically don't do any waterchanges during the Prazi-Pro treatment, but I do regular water changes when dosing the ParaGuard.

I have had an ammonia spike in my QT (nearly lost my Scooter) and I nearly lost my itty bitty Fox Face to too much flow. Worth noting is that both of these incidents occurred when I used the Nano Cube for the QT, and not one of the bigger tanks. Clearly, what I'm saving in reduced medication and Prime costs in the smaller tank are being offset by greater risk to the livestock. Not a good trade off, IMO. I have never had a close call of any sort in my 30s.

I have PVC pipes for the QTs, and I do use some rock in them. I may, depending on the species of fish, also use sand in the QT.

I don't QT inverts, though I feel quite strongly that I should. I'm confused about how to feed them. I'll be doing a big invert order from J&L in a month or so, so I need to figure that out.

I don't QT coral any more, as my QT lighting systems aren't enough to sustain most corals. When I do my LED build for my display system I'll move the display tank's T5 fixture over to a QT tank for corals (though the 33 gallon QT tank will be replaced by a 23 gallon long: 36x12x12).