IS IT TRUE THAT 80% OF PEOPLE WILL HAVE FISH LOSSES DUE TO DISEASE/PARASITES IN FIRST 8 MONTHS IF DONT QUARANTINE ?

ying yang

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Hi all,hope all is well.

Just realised this is extremely long post so if want to skimm over it and just say if qt or not and have you lost fish in first 8 months or not to diesese/parasites feel free

I'm seeing over and over that if dont quarantine fishes and when buy cuc/inverts or add anything wet to tank then we will have fish losses from diesese/parasites before the 8 month point in 80% of cases,which seems extremely high.
Now this thread isnt to call anyone a liar who says this,it's just my curiousity and to get a rough gauge of the problem if it exists

As I'm having a very hard time thinking this to be the case as I've read countless threads on whether r2r members qt or not and majority do not qt at all so if 80% of people that don't qt have fish losses then that's absurd amount of fish dying,or is is it the case as I read often said that there's so many people posting about their fish died or dying from a fish diesese/ parasite and need help,that people are in the diesese forum because they got a problem and don't make a thread there saying " hey my fish are alive and well "

So......can copy and paste this next bit out if applies to you to make easier or add onto it or delete or answer how you may.just add time in if needed etc

I do an observational qt on all newly bought fish for ..... length of time .and also to get fish eating properley away from other fish.

I do a medicated qt on all newly bought fish and I use the following medications and follow jay hemdal or humblefish recomendations on dosage/ duration.

I only do medicated qt if fish shows sign of ill health .

I dont qt and just temp/ drip aclimitise my fish then add straight to display tank or some I read add to sump.

Then if you may say how many fish you lost in first 8 months of setting the tank up either lost whilst medicating from overdosing,equipment failure,bullying,diesese still showed up on fish even though did very extensive medicated qt,or if no qt and fish died of diesese/ parasites ( this last one is what I'm wanting to really find out) aw and roughly how long did it take for fish to die please.

Feel free to add anything you feel relevant as I've read many threads where people state there fish are immune to dieseses in their tank and they want to add parasites occasionally to refresh the fishes immunity,and they feed fresh food,live food and no dry food or very little etc .( only works in a very mature reef they say)
And I know there many contributory factors why a fish could die as could die ( diesese,parasites,wrong food,bullying,tank size,overstocked,or many other factors .

So is it 80% of people that make threads in r2r diesese forum lose fishes to diesese in the first 8 months of tank.
Or is it 80% of all reefers who don't qt at all lose fishes to diesese/parasites in first 8 months ?

I've read that either 100k or 300k of Americans in u.s have saltwater tanks by a r2r member ( how true this is or not idk but if even 100k and 80% of people just lose 2 fish to diesese/parasites in first 8 months then that's 160k fishes lost just in u.s alone or is it 80% of the posters that say there fish are diesesed lose fish in first 8 months that ACTUALLY start a thread then % of fish lost going be much lower.


I will start it off by saying new to saltwater at 9 months and 1 of first fish I bought had possible brookenla diesese and took straight back to lfs and got another 2 clowns from same tank and did observational qt for 30 days in same tank that I put first 2 clowns in and didn't change water or nothing and the rest of my fish I put straight in display tank and lost 0 fish so far ( lfs did tell me that the 2 clowns I took back,1 died few days later,it looked good when I bought it and dont know if missed the signs on that one clown or stress of it being in bag and/or bullying from other clown caused it to look so bad straight away as put in my qt tank idk)



Thanks very much and enjoy rest your day
 
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vetteguy53081

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It may be an average and not ALL as it’s been years since I lost any fish to anything and last time I did, it was due to leak and I placed fish in buckets with air stone which was all I had and some lost due to low level oxygen and I’m sure ammonia
 
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ying yang

ying yang

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It may be an average and not ALL as it’s been years since I lost any fish to anything and last time I did, it was due to leak and I placed fish in buckets with air stone which was all I had and some lost due to low level oxygen and I’m sure ammonia
Yeah I have feeling that it's 80% of people that actually started a thread in the diesese forum lost fish in first 8 months and not 80% of ALL new tanks that don't qt ,as makes sense 80% of people will lose fish in a new tank if actually started a thread on it buy we shall see of get a few answers.
 

Sharkbait19

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@brandon429
I don’t think that 80% of all reefers have losses if they don’t quarantine, but certainly believe it’s a high number. People don’t say they have a problem until they do. And the sample size here can only be used to estimate all of them.
My first round of fish lasted 2 months. I didn’t quarantine and even when fish were dying I did nothing. Lesson learned.
When my fallow was finally over, I did it the right way: keep fish in qt and observe for any possible disease, and treat for whatever shows up. I’ll do a preventative dewormer on my fish too just to be safe.
No disease problems in the dt since. Only had the start of brook on my clowns due to improper fallow (so back to the qt they went). Been quite some time now since the clowns first went in and not a ich cyst, fluke, or anything since. Working on getting my firefish through the qt now, and then I will be done adding fish.

It’s all about luck of the draw. Some fish will be sick when you get them, others won’t. Some may even wait until they’re out of qt for it to show up. Do I think that everyone who doesn’t qt will wind up with disease? No. But I ask, is it really worth the risk?
Part of it is having an initial loss too. If you go your entire reefing career with no losses and no qt, it won’t make sense to. But when something does go wrong, you see the importance. I’m not saying anyone is right or wrong for qt or not, just what I think the process is for most people.
 
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ying yang

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I dont qt and just temp/ drip acclimate my fish then add straight to display tank or some I read add to sump.

In my first 8 months I lost a damsel to a very aggressive arrow crab who hunted it down... Watched him tear it in half. I also lost a goby who jumped.
Thanks for reading extremely long post and I edited first post to make it not as long but took screenshot of what deleted and will post here now so not lost ^_^
 

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ying yang

ying yang

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@brandon429
I don’t think that 80% of all reefers have losses if they don’t quarantine, but certainly believe it’s a high number. People don’t say they have a problem until they do. And the sample size here can only be used to estimate all of them.
My first round of fish lasted 2 months. I didn’t quarantine and even when fish were dying I did nothing. Lesson learned.
When my fallow was finally over, I did it the right way: keep fish in qt and observe for any possible disease, and treat for whatever shows up. I’ll do a preventative dewormer on my fish too just to be safe.
No disease problems in the dt since. Only had the start of brook on my clowns due to improper fallow (so back to the qt they went). Been quite some time now since the clowns first went in and not a ich cyst, fluke, or anything since. Working on getting my firefish through the qt now, and then I will be done adding fish.

It’s all about luck of the draw. Some fish will be sick when you get them, others won’t. Some may even wait until they’re out of qt for it to show up. Do I think that everyone who doesn’t qt will wind up with disease? No. But I ask, is it really worth the risk?
Part of it is having an initial loss too. If you go your entire reefing career with no losses and no qt, it won’t make sense to. But when something does go wrong, you see the importance. I’m not saying anyone is right or wrong for qt or not, just what I think the process is for most people.
Thanks for reply and thoughts .
Yeah this isn't scientific study on this thread I know this and only give myself a glimpse into it but I've asked this question few times and never got an answer so thought I start a thread and my thoughts initially was to qt medicate every fish and put inverts in own tank with no fish for several weeks but then did around about turn but reading such high % losses in fishes often makes me doubt myself and think have I made a big mistake by not qt everything as I don't qt because no room or no money or no space or no oatience as had empty tank for 5 years,was just a choice I made so seeing the replies here will further help myself also and hopefully others if the amount of replies says that most don't qt and lost fishes due to diesese or just read some general good advice ^_^
 

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Thanks for reply and thoughts .
Yeah this isn't scientific study on this thread I know this and only give myself a glimpse into it but I've asked this question few times and never got an answer so thought I start a thread and my thoughts initially was to qt medicate every fish and put inverts in own tank with no fish for several weeks but then did around about turn but reading such high % losses in fishes often makes me doubt myself and think have I made a big mistake by not qt everything as I don't qt because no room or no money or no space or no oatience as had empty tank for 5 years,was just a choice I made so seeing the replies here will further help myself also and hopefully others if the amount of replies says that most don't qt and lost fishes due to diesese or just read some general good advice ^_^
If you are getting from a good vendor that has healthy fish, then you have a pretty good chance of being safe. Disease most often pops up in the first few weeks of addition, or when fish are stressed.
Once you know your fish have been together for a while without disease, I think it’s pretty safe to assume there won’t be further issues. Just may want to dip new corals (if you don’t already) to minimize risk of introducing disease that way.
 

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I think you are hung up on an 80% figure. Not sure where the number came from and does not sound accurate, but not sure if the actual percentage is relevant.

Remember QT is not about protecting the new fish(though using it for proactive treatment is) it is about protecting the existing DT fish.
 

vetteguy53081

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A lot will depend on practices, husbandry, diet and understanding of disease and causes.
Thanks for reply and thoughts .
Yeah this isn't scientific study on this thread I know this and only give myself a glimpse into it but I've asked this question few times and never got an answer so thought I start a thread and my thoughts initially was to qt medicate every fish and put inverts in own tank with no fish for several weeks but then did around about turn but reading such high % losses in fishes often makes me doubt myself and think have I made a big mistake by not qt everything as I don't qt because no room or no money or no space or no oatience as had empty tank for 5 years,was just a choice I made so seeing the replies here will further help myself also and hopefully others if the amount of replies says that most don't qt and lost fishes due to diesese or just read some general good advice ^_^
 

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then that's absurd amount of fish dying,
Work in a fish store. It's disheartening.

,that people are in the diesese forum because they got a problem and don't make a thread there saying " hey my fish are alive and well "
I believe that there is a lot of this.

I find that with new fish you struggle with two things.

The first and for me the most important is getting the fish eating. Most have not been feeding their entire journey and are timid with food. BTW this is not a wild behaviour, fish are pigs. You see this natural behaviour come back after you have had them for a while. Food is tough and most fish will try anything if they get really hungry. Getting them to eat after this is REALLY difficult. I would say that almost all of my new fish during this time end up with some sort of parasite or disease. They "scratch" a lot or have visible signs of infestation. After years of observing this phenomona I have finally learned to ignore it and focus on tank stability and ensuring the fish is eating. This can be incredibly nerve wracking because everything inside of us is screaming that we have to do something. This process is not easy, and I have found the more mature the tank the easier the process is.

The second is somewhat of an outcropping of the first. You need to deal with a fish that has been medicated every step of the journey (assuming you bought non-quarintined fish, and then they off load that burden from you for a price). This creates a creature that is not going to do very well being thrown back into a "natural" environment. Ensuring that the tank will help not hinder recovery takes some planning and patience, but I find doing this to be much easier and more successful than using quarintining with medication.

My 2 cents.

EDIT: I just want to add because I forgot, that the odds of survival of a fish go up dramaticly when that fish gets on prepared food.
 
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@Sharkbait19 one of the many reasons I decided to not qt was read many times ( ich resistant strain" so thought if go through with all effort/ time and expense of qt and whilst in qt my fish show no signs of diesese/ parasites so put in dt then few months later it shows its ugly face then I be gutted but it would ovbiously lessen the chances if medicated all fish first,but over the last 9 months ( well last few years whilst researching it been very confusing times on what I should do as so many opinions to read and read stuff like if " a person hasn't got cancer would you give that person cancer treating drugs" then others saying we in control of fishy lives so owe it to them so all very confusing .
But we can only read and research what we can and then make an informed choice for ourselves and if choose to not qt then all fish or alot die due to diesese/ parasites then its a very expensive lesson to learn and then even harder to try put right possibly and will think to myself why the heck didn't I just qt everything in first place.
But I just struggle to think why is saltwater fish more prone to diesese/parasites than freshwater fish and not lost a freshwater fish for years apart from old age.

But lots of factors with anything in saltwater fish regarding diesese like type of fish and its slime coat and certain fish are more sceptable to certain dieseses than others I guess.and yeah you could be right in that it's down to luck whether get fish with diesese or not and just needs some stress event to trigger it ( like 2 clowns I bought and seen no clamped fins or ill fish whatsoever ) but put in qt tank and soon after it got clamped fins and pale then mucus peeling off skin next day.
It's a very interesting subject and see it highly debated nearly every day.
 

i cant think

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15-16 fish, all a few months of age, some are only from this years September/august, others have been 2 years+. No QT and all still thrive today! Here’s what they are, starting with the wrasse:
- Cirrhilabrus lubbocki (Cebu Lubbock fairy)
- Cirrhilabrus lubbocki (indo Lubbock fairy)
- Cirrhilabrus melanomarginalis (Black fin fairy)
- Cirrhilabrus naokoae (Naokos fairy)
- Halichoeres iridis (Radiant)
- Halichoeres chloropterus (Jade wrasse)
- Macropharyngodon bipartitus (Blue star leopard)
- Pseudocheilinops ataenia (Pink streak wrasse)
- Siganus magnificus (Magnificent Foxface)
- Ctenochaetus binotatus (Twin spot bristletooth tang)
- Genicanthus melanospilos (Swallowtail Angel)
- Escenius lineatus (Linear Blenny)
- Stonogobiops yasha (Yasha goby)
- Gobiodon astrangulatus (Black clown goby)
- Amphiprion occelaris x percula (Black photon clownfish)
- Chelmon rostratum (Copperbanded butterfly)

I will add, these are split over two tanks. The naoko fairy and blue star leopard wrasses are in my nano and going into my 4’ tank eventually but the Blenny, gobies and pink streak wrasse are staying in my nano. The rest are in my 4’ tank and the jade is being rejoined this week due to aggression. I may replace her with another Halichoeres wrasse (H. biocellatus) but she will probably be replaced with a flashing tilefish since everyone else in that tank are peaceful. Here’s my favourite three fish together, I do not QT I throw my fish straight into the main display tanks so it’s less stress on them and they have plenty of live fauna to chomp on. Yes my naoko and leopard will still be moving tank but Atleast I’ll give them a year to grow and be able to combat the big boy wrasse in my 4’ tank.
5B5D8D63-8E41-4031-97A9-3B13D8D207AC.jpeg
 

i cant think

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no qt.
2 out of 30+ lost to disease/parasites. no other fish in the system were affected.
how many fish die in qt?
and does one just assume those would have died anyways if they hadn't been qt'd?
This is why I don’t qt. it leads to unnecessary stress on a fish but yes if it was a moorish or something like that thriving maybe I would do QT but I would leave it to the LFS to do it. I don’t take risks of copper killing the fish I like and I don’t care if it bites me in the back, I find if that fish thrives it will fight off any parasite you just need to give it time and not act instantly.
 

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15-16 fish, all a few months of age, some are only from this years September/august, others have been 2 years+. No QT and all still thrive today! Here’s what they are, starting with the wrasse:
- Cirrhilabrus lubbocki (Cebu Lubbock fairy)
- Cirrhilabrus lubbocki (indo Lubbock fairy)
- Cirrhilabrus melanomarginalis (Black fin fairy)
- Cirrhilabrus naokoae (Naokos fairy)
- Halichoeres iridis (Radiant)
- Halichoeres chloropterus (Jade wrasse)
- Macropharyngodon bipartitus (Blue star leopard)
- Pseudocheilinops ataenia (Pink streak wrasse)
- Siganus magnificus (Magnificent Foxface)
- Ctenochaetus binotatus (Twin spot bristletooth tang)
- Genicanthus melanospilos (Swallowtail Angel)
- Escenius lineatus (Linear Blenny)
- Stonogobiops yasha (Yasha goby)
- Gobiodon astrangulatus (Black clown goby)
- Amphiprion occelaris x percula (Black photon clownfish)
- Chelmon rostratum (Copperbanded butterfly)

I will add, these are split over two tanks. The naoko fairy and blue star leopard wrasses are in my nano and going into my 4’ tank eventually but the Blenny, gobies and pink streak wrasse are staying in my nano. The rest are in my 4’ tank and the jade is being rejoined this week due to aggression. I may replace her with another Halichoeres wrasse (H. biocellatus) but she will probably be replaced with a flashing tilefish since everyone else in that tank are peaceful. Here’s my favourite three fish together, I do not QT I throw my fish straight into the main display tanks so it’s less stress on them and they have plenty of live fauna to chomp on. Yes my naoko and leopard will still be moving tank but Atleast I’ll give them a year to grow and be able to combat the big boy wrasse in my 4’ tank.
5B5D8D63-8E41-4031-97A9-3B13D8D207AC.jpeg
Last time I lost a fish it was two wrasse (One naoko and a silvery belly). Both lost because of the naoko getting a spinal injury after hitting the mesh lid - I can’t remember if that was hard mesh or soft though I think it was hard because my fish have jumped many of times and still not had an issue (Main reason to the Jade being ditched).
 

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Is is true that people that qt lose 80% of their fish before they even get to the display. And is true that people who use prophylactic treatments especially copper and antibiorics, lose a high percentage of those fish within the year. The answer to both us yes
 

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