QUARANTINE BASICS

OVERVIEW

When the topic of quarantining new additions to prevent and treat diseases is mentioned to many hobbyists, the idea is often either resisted or ignored for various reasons. Most often, the reasons provided are "I have no room or equipment to quarantine" or "I only buy fish that appear healthy". The purpose of this article is to dispel the myths by detailing the facts of the matter--1)Quarantining new livestock is absolutely essential. 2)Quarantining new livestock is ridiculously simple and inexpensive. I would recommend the following methods be used before introducing EVERY new purchase before it goes into the main tank, including any inverts, liverock, etc. and the term "livestock" will be used in reference to all of them throughout this article. The only important difference is that inverts and liverock should not be quarantined in a tank (or equipment) that has had meds used in/with it. Fish and other livestock collected from the wild are far from sterile, regardless of how they might appear. It is very common to have a variety of parasites, both internal and external, riding along into the holding tanks of our favorite LFS or online retailer. In fact, many believe that it is likely that ALL fish in particular collected from the wild have some form of internal parasite! When introduced directly into a display tank, the obvious closed confines are a perfect place for these guys to proliferate out of control. It is not unheard of to have a whole tank wiped out by the introduction of one fish that "appeared healthy." Unfortunately, the aquarium industry has approached this issue by producing and marketing a variety of products directed at treating the parasites instead of promoting simple prevention (yet again, profits are the priority in the hobby). Most of these cannot be used in a tank with any form of invertebrate. The rest have received less that spectacular reviews by either not being very effective or worse, cause terrible stress on the livestock. The answer to this dilemma is really quite easy, yet greatly misunderstood by most aquarists....quarantine! The rest of this article will be a complete guide on how to virtually eliminate the possibility of introducing parasites and other pathogens into your display tank, without taking a lot of time or money as most people believe.

MATERIALS

A quarantine tank is simple, not just because that is desired, but because it is actually a necessity. Liverock cannot be used because it can render several medications useless. No substrate should be used as vacuuming the bottom of the tank may be required when treating for different parasites to remove some of the cysts (a particular life cycle stage) to aid treatment. For most smaller adult and juvenile fish, a 20g long tank will be a great basis for a quarantine tank. 10g tanks can be used for smaller fish, but in this author's opinion, the extra water volume afforded by the 20g comes in handy in regards to keeping stable water conditions. As with regular tanks, the rest of the setup has to cover the principles of water movement (including oxygenation) and filtration. This can be accomplished through a simple HOB (hang-on-back) filter. A simple Normal Output (NO) flourescent light fixture will provide adequate light, reef lighting is not needed. A piece of PVC pipe will provide cover for fish to retreat to, reducing quite a bit of stress that could make them more susceptible to disease.

PREPARING TO QUARANTINE

This may be a good place to bring up and answer the most common question/problem, "I don't want to have to keep a tank running (cycled) all of the time." This is a valid issue, but is easily overcome. While it should be understood, it still needs to be stated that no fish should be an impulse buy. This simple rule can allow you to be able to set up and break down the quarantine tank with each purchase. The key is that approximately two weeks before your purchase, you can add the HOB filter media to your sump or tank to get inoculated with bacteria. This will create a suitable bacterial colony to handle the introduction of one purchase at a time. **Note** Media used for the HOB filter should be disposed of and replaced for each QT to avoid contamination of any disease, parasites, or medications that may have been used. By one "purchase", I mean one livestock selection (within reason, a cleanup crew of snails need not be purchased one at a time). It is not wise to attempt quarantining multiple livestock, if one is carrying a pathogen or parasite it can easily spread to all the others defeating the purpose of quarantine in general. **Note**With the increased popularity of mail order fish, it is expensive to purchase singular specimens of livestock and thus many "deals" have emerged to make it more cost effective, for example buying "X" amount of livestock earns free shipping. This is dangerous if not quarantining all separately (among other issues endangering livestock) as detailed above, and thus the novelty of mail order will not be promoted by the staff on this site. The livestock should be acclimated normally, and the quarantine procedure officially begins that will take up a minimum of the next 4 weeks (4 weeks is not a magic number, but rather an effective measure of many parasites' life cycle. The absence of any symptoms of such parasites during this time normally ensures general good health in this regard. If there is any disease or parasite, treatment should be implemented and then the 4 week period restarts). This doubles as an excellent time to acclimate the new livestock to tank life, conditions far different than the wild no matter how hard we try to replicate it. Fish especially can get acclimated to feeding and confined spaces without having to endure the aggression of the other fish that already have established territory. As far as any treatments during quarantine, this is left for fish only, as any medications or salinity adjustments is not tolerated by corals or other invertebrates. For fish, there are plenty of viewpoints. Personally, I prefer a "wait and see" approach for any symptoms over preventative dosing of medications, but this is again just my own personal choice.

When new fish or fish not previously quarantined do unfortunately need treatment, it is very important to make the correct diagnosis. Some can be seen here

Once identified, the best treatment can be determined based on fish type. Caution must be used for choosing treatment as many type of scaleless and non-bony fish are quite sensitive to certain treatments. Below are some of the more common ailments and possible recommended treatments:

In most all cases only one type of treatment is needed or recommended. Hyposalinity should never be accompanied by copper. It can however be used with anti-biotics which can often be needed during or near the end of treatment. One of the many failings of treatment is not being prepared for possible secondary infections caused by parasites. Anti-biotics can be an effective treatment for these eventualities such as fungal infections, cloudy eye or gill infections. It should also be noted that a vast majority of these infections are of a gram negative nature and rarely gram positive. Freshwater meds will as a rule be gram positive and should not be used. In more extreme cases, copper is the most effective and quickest treatment. Coppersafe (Mardel Labs) and Cupramine (Seachem) are among the most noted and effective available. It is also necessary to get the proper copper test depending on the chosen brand. The two aforementioned are "chelated" and must be monitored with a chelated test kit. Purchasing the corresponding test kit made by the same manufacturer is the best option. Once treatment has been affected and the livestock has recovered, it is recommended that the fish be maintained in the QT for a full 4 weeks to ensure the treatment was indeed successful and there is no secondary infection. The fish can then be properly acclimated back to the main tank providing it has remained fallow for the same 4 week duration.

CONCLUSION

Following successful quarantine, the livestock can be acclimated into the main tank with the confidence that they are a healthy contribution to the system. Following acclimation, it can be recommended to keep the quarantine tank up for a few weeks just in case there is any problem with the new addition, such as injuries resulting from aggression. With no problems, the tank can be taken down and placed back into storage!

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