Avoiding introduction of parasites on inverts

germs101 · Jul 18, 2016

If I bought an anemone, and it is not attached to anything, what type of quarantine process is needed to avoid possibility introducing ich or other parasites? Would a 3 stage dip of salt water work at all? What about Corals that are attached? How long must they "hang out" before joining the display before it's"safe"?

Joeganja · Jul 19, 2016

You can always make a quarantine tank. Your question isn't really clear. Ich is introduced only by fish and yes it can be in the water column but ich on a rock or anemone is highly unlikely. To dip coral you can buy coral dips like coral rx but you can't do invertebrates liek anemones or anything else. You can also dip rocks in coral dips.

germs101 · Jul 19, 2016

I'm fallow in my DT right now, so I'm being extra cautious about additions. I realize the parasites only infect fish, but they can hitchhike on coral skeletons, and I don't want to reset my clock on the fallow period. I was just curious how that would relate to an invert without a hard surface such as anemones, shrimp, cucumbers, etc.

4FordFamily · Jul 19, 2016

I'm watching this too. My invert qt was a total flop, I suspect dying clams crashed it though.

My understanding is that the only way to be sure is to "fallow" new additions for 76 days. I will be buying coral and inverts in large batches and probably buy an established reef tank and keep it running solely for this purpose. Perhaps a 54 corner or something smaller. I like the corner because it's compact.

FarmerTy · Jul 19, 2016

I've been QTing for 45 days for CUC/inverts. Ich tomonts (the encysted stage) are our concern so anything that's a hard surface is a suspect, such as live rock, hard skeletons of corals, shells of snails, etc. Interestingly, it appears that urchins and starfish were shown to not have attachments of tomonts on them in a study so you can ideally rinse and place in the tank. Obviously take more careful measure with acclimating both to the display water as both happen to be very sensitive to salinity changes. I would preferably acclimate to a bucket of display water first with a pump/bubbler and transfer it to the bucket for a day and then add it to the display, just to be extra safe.

I only am running 45 days for QT as even in my fully running frag tank that I use as my QT as well, I have a 20-30% mortality rate on CUC I bring in. Going the full 76 days, I would expect a 50% mortality rate because a 20 gallon tank with little algal growth is not an ideal condition for them. I feel safe with the 45 days as for a fluke study where the tomonts were able to survive 70+ days, the majority of the studies had the tomonts hatching at under 35 days. While we can't guarantee anything 100%, I feel pretty comfortable with my odds in my routine.

germs101 · Jul 19, 2016

FarmerTy said:
I've been QTing for 45 days for CUC/inverts. Ich tomonts (the encysted stage) are our concern so anything that's a hard surface is a suspect, such as live rock, hard skeletons of corals, shells of snails, etc. Interestingly, it appears that urchins and starfish were shown to not have attachments of tomonts on them in a study so you can ideally rinse and place in the tank. Obviously take more careful measure with acclimating both to the display water as both happen to be very sensitive to salinity changes. I would preferably acclimate to a bucket of display water first with a pump/bubbler and transfer it to the bucket for a day and then add it to the display, just to be extra safe.

I only am running 45 days for QT as even in my fully running frag tank that I use as my QT as well, I have a 20-30% mortality rate on CUC I bring in. Going the full 76 days, I would expect a 50% mortality rate because a 20 gallon tank with little algal growth is not an ideal condition for them. I feel safe with the 45 days as for a fluke study where the tomonts were able to survive 70+ days, the majority of the studies had the tomonts hatching at under 35 days. While we can't guarantee anything 100%, I feel pretty comfortable with my odds in my routine.

This is exactly what I was hoping someone would share! Would shrimp be considered to have a place for tomonts to encrust?