# Quarantine?



## BUGGER (Nov 7, 2013)

Coming from a reef side of the hobby, quarantine was a must for me, but I don't have quarantine set up anymore. I'm getting a total of 18 fish, rasboras, corys and ottos. How do you feel about quarantine? thanks


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## Tugg (Jul 28, 2013)

I know we're supposed to and that people with expensive fish typically do it, but I'm impatient and my tank is filled with $1/fish community fish so I just dumped them in.

The otos are the ones I would be worried about. From what I've read, they don't digest the algae they eat. They have bacteria that do it for them. If the bacteria in the digestive track have starved off from all the moving/stress, they will die. For most, it seems to be about a 50% death rate in adding new ones to a tank. If your tank is heavily planted you may not be able to find them.

For the otos, I would drip acclimate at a minimum.


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## BUGGER (Nov 7, 2013)

I will drip acclimate at the very least. Sometimes when you get a bunch of fish at a time, it only takes one sick fish to infect the others.


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## AKnickolai (Nov 30, 2007)

You can get by without a Q tank, but it is just luck. All you need is a heater and an air stone to set up a Q tank. I use a cheap plastic tub instead of a tank. If you have a spare filter you can shove some zeolite in even better, or just do water changes every day or two to keep the un-cycled tank in good shape. Q tanks are much easier places to treat fish for diseases as you don't have to worry about any of the meds you might have to use harming plants, shrimp, or other species in the main tank. I've personally been burned too many times trying to skip the quarantine process. It' not just for fish either. Plants can bring in all sorts of not so fun things like hydra and certain types of algae, all of which are easier to eradicate in a Q tank.


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## ObiQuiet (Oct 9, 2009)

AKnickolai said:


> You can get by without a Q tank, but it is just luck.


What I don't understand is why people rely on luck, when a Q tank is an easy excuse to have another aquarium....


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## BUGGER (Nov 7, 2013)

Do you treat them with meds while in quarantine or just observe the fish for couple of weeks before going into the display tank?


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## Tugg (Jul 28, 2013)

ObiQuiet said:


> What I don't understand is why people rely on luck, when a Q tank is an easy excuse to have another aquarium....


Because another aquarium quickly becomes another stocked tank and is no longer available.


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## BUGGER (Nov 7, 2013)

A lot of people don't quarantine if they only have one tank and only need couple of fish. They just see it as added cost and more work. And once quarantining is over, it will become another display tank. I might just take my chances with this one.


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## niko (Jan 28, 2004)

If you are coming from a reef background please understand that freshwater fish are viewed as the cheapest bit of everything that the stores try to unload on you - equipment, chemicals, foods. And as the cheapest thing in the whole scam they are treated like dirt.

I used to import rare freshwater fish. The reality is ugly. Long story short - no one quarantines. The fish you got from the store today where on the airplane few days ago. 

The imported fish die in two ways - immediately or about a month and a half later. That is an observation from importing about 250 species and thousands of actual fish. The fish that die later are often in perfect health, eating, brightly colored. A real quaranite should last 2 months. No one does that. We quarantined for at least one month (often the fish sold in matter of 3-5 months so the quarantine was actually that long) and nobody cared about getting quarantined fish. People want cheap and right now. So guess what you will find at the store - non quarantined fish that are there only to hook you up on buying everything else.

My advice - NEVER put a fish straight in your tank. It can bring wonderful diseases that will wipe out all other fish exactly when you think everything is ok. Quarantine for at least a month and a half. Or just do what most people do - get cheap fish and don't really care if they die because they can get more cheap fish.

And yes, medicines are a joke. A shot in the dark at best.

Also in the freshwater trade there are no rare fish. Everything you can dig up on the internet is available for import. Actually it is not uncommon for exporters to also have fish that have not been described or fully described by science. Do not assume they are expensive. The price of a fish is determined by the demand. A black goby that one of our very experienced exporters had never seen in his long years of trading fish was impossible to sell in the US. But people kept asking for cardinals, Blue tetras, and fish they know about. The rare and truly rare fish usually have lower prices on the wholesale lists. Because few, very few people want them. Hence they are not exported/imported. How amusing.

This is indeed a hobby that is very different than saltwater. Often the bottom line is that no one has done any research on a topic because there are no money involved. The money in the freshwater hobby is way less than in reefs/saltwater tank hobby. Remember that - it explains many things.


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## Tugg (Jul 28, 2013)

I hate to sound pessimistic, but Niko is 100% right.


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## BUGGER (Nov 7, 2013)

I totally agree. The people who think they can buy and if the fish dies they can just buy again, it's not just because freshwater fish are cheap, they don't really care about the hobby. Pet stores although not all of them don't care either in giving proper advice or they will lose sale on the spot. You know I feel bad when I go to LFS and see the feeder fish, and those are being fed by the people who doesn't even know what quarantining fish means. 
Anyway, fish from LFS to quarantine, do you medicate them or just observe and medicate if needed?


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## niko (Jan 28, 2004)

Of course there are stores that are not like the others. If you have such a store near you you know about it. Everybody else is the meat grinder that makes money.

Pre-medicating: From my experience the only thing you should do is to raise the temperature if you see any kind of a disease. Even ich can have many forms and medicines do not really work. With expensive fish there are ways to find out what exactly is the disease and treat it but even that does not work every time. Importers of wild fish have a way to deal with medication - they run the fish through all the major medications back to back. You don't know what you are dealing with so you blast everything you can without thinking. Crazy idea but if the fish is expensive enough you too would do it. Cheap small fish don't get to taste every medicine under the sun...

With all freshwater fish the goal is to keep them well fed AND in super clean water. Then you are using their natural abilities to fight anything that is in the tank that can cause them harm. Get as big of a sponge air driven filter (the best filter there is, especially if you buy Poret foam) as you can get, make sure that it is never plugged up and dirty and in addition to that change water every two days (10-15%). Premix the decholirinator - do not do what most folk do - use the aquarium as a reaction vessel for the tap water + dechlorinator. Use either Prime or Amquel. The other dechlorinators are a joke, including pricewise. Live plants would be great in a QT tank too unless they deteriorate, get yellow, or do not grow (then they release stuff in the water that you don't see but it pollutes the water).

The food: You must feed a variety of foods. Frozen, dry, live. Nothing provides everything needed if served by itself.


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## BUGGER (Nov 7, 2013)

Sounds good, I have an empty ten gallon that I can use.


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