Talk me off the Edge! (About to dump new fish in the Display)

[Biglurr54]

I have two new fish coming in today. A pyramid Butterfly and a filamented wrasse. My last batch of filamented wrasses (two females and one male) all passed away during TTM. That was a tough pill to swallow. The only time I have had good luck with new fish is when the start looking bad in QT and I dump them into the display in a last ditch effort to save them. Every time I quarantine or do tank transfer the fish do poorly. Their condition slowly goes down hill the entire time then they go in the display and they bounce back.


I am tempted to but the new fish right in the display and provide them with a good healthy diet to fight off any issues they have.


I have a 20 gallon set up and cycled for about 3 months but I haven’t ghost fed it in a few weeks or so.

 

[Nopy117]

I... actually did this exact thing a few weeks ago. I was taking a very military strict approach to QT and just not getting results, so I decided to take a page from @Paul B 's book and start managing my fish's health rather than eradicating diseases, and I've had success so far.
There's one huge caveat with this plan tho. This will not work if you get your tank infected with Velvet, Brook, Uronema, or ANY Gram negative bacterial infections.

I'm currently managing ich in my 25 lagoon, and its going great, I've been dosing herbal supplements, soaking selcon in my food, switched from once a day feeding to 4 or 5, and starting running an "oversized" UV which is anything 1/3 Watt per gallon or larger.

My new Qt regimen is much simpler, and will be tested shortly, but its as follows here.
A shorter more rapid QT cycle, no more waiting out for ich (tanks already got it, dont care) what im Qting for is the nasties, (Velvet, Brook, Uronema, or ANY Gram negative bacterial infections) I haven't decided on the exact time frame yet, but its certainly not going to be a month, and I'm making changes to my QT to be more fish friendly and low stress, adding more PVC, and getting CP instead of copper.

This, coupled with a long observation period at the LFS (which is also dicey, since I'm close enough with the owner to have him isolate fish and not add anymore to the systems I'm watching, I understand not everyone can have this relationship with the lfs) And I also stress this is only effective if you are only Qting for aggressive diseases that will actually show themselves in a timely manner, since we all know ich can hide indefinitely on an immune fish.

I never recommend just dropping fish into a display without having done these steps above, although I got away with it once with my wrasse, I still had the observation period at the LFS, something I assume you wont have since you are getting these fish in the mail.

 

[chipmunkofdoom2]

Fish can survive in pretty deplorable conditions for a long time. Unless you have an exquisitely sensitive fish or are a terrible aquarist, your QT tank will not kill fish. Not if you follow any one of the many easy guides on R2R about QT setups. If you follow a quality guide on QT and your fish die in QT anyway, it's because they unfortunately were destined to die no matter what.

 

[Biglurr54]

This is what i needed to hear. Keep the encouragement coming. My display thanks you. Not sure the new fish tank you though!

 

[Nopy117]

Fish can survive in pretty deplorable conditions for a long time. Unless you have an exquisitely sensitive fish or are a terrible aquarist, your QT tank will not kill fish. Not if you follow any one of the many easy guides on R2R about QT setups. If you follow a quality guide on QT and your fish die in QT anyway, it's because they unfortunately were destined to die no matter what.

I do agree to a certain extent, but the qt environment is a stressful one by default, now add a disease and medication in the mix and it can be tough to handle for many people. It’s important to remeber qt is not 100% and the pros writing these articles have put hundreds of fish through qt, id be interested to see the survival rate of the first 100 fish compared to all after that. Even with the recommended meds, procedures and practices. New hobbyists won’t have the same success.

 

[Johniejumbo]

I haven’t quarantined anything in years
I’ve been lucky so far and don’t recommend it. Heck of a gamble.

 

[chipmunkofdoom2]

I do agree to a certain extent, but the qt environment is a stressful one by default, now add a disease and medication in the mix and it can be tough to handle for many people.

How so? What more does a tank need than some seeded biological material from your DT and a few hiding places? How is that substantially different than your DT?

I also wasn't advocating medicating fish prophylactically, but if you can dose and test alkalinity, you can certainly measure out a few mL of medicine if you need to.

It’s important to remeber qt is not 100%

What do you mean by this? That it's not possible to eradicate 100% of diseases/parasites with QT? Or that not 100% of fish survive QT?

 

[Big G]

This works for me. Haven't lost a fish in QT for quite awhile. Your mileage may vary:

Prophylactic Treatment: No observed symptoms of disease or injury

20 gal QT cycled: HOB with foam pad & BioMax treated with Bio Spira/Dr Tims, foam bubble filter with foam soaked for at least 2 weeks in DT sump, heater, small powerhead (Hydor 240) aimed at the surface actively agitating the surface for much higher O2 exchange, Seachem Ammonia Alert Badge.
Tank lights off. Ambient room lighting only.
Feed fish with white/black worms, vitamin & fiber packed frozen fish cubes: use one cube of 6-8 different flavors like cyclops, mysis, chopped clams, seaweed, etc. with Selcon/Zoecon for at least 3 days before prophylactically treating with any meds.
Freshwater dip to check for flukes.
S-l-o-w-l-y (8-10 days) bring up copper to therapeutic levels for prophylactic treatment for 30 days: Tank lights off until therapeutic level is reached. Best to dose several times a day (AM, lunch, PM) rather than one large dose. Use a Hanna HL Copper Checker with Copper Power. Avoid Coppersafe like the plague.
Carbon & Cuprisorb to remove copper. Water changes. Observe.
General Cure 2 doses 5-7 days apart. Turn up bubbler and turn on powerhead aimed at surface to increase O2. Like GC over Prazipro. GC has Metro + Praziquantel, so you are getting the Praziquantel which kills flukes and "some" internal parasites and Metro that kills all internal parasites/worms. And the dose of Praziquantel is lower but does the job and is easier on sensitive fish.
Carbon & water changes.
Observe 10-14 days.

 

[4FordFamily]

This works for me. Haven't lost a fish in QT for quite awhile. Your mileage may vary:

Prophylactic Treatment: No observed symptoms of disease or injury

20 gal QT cycled: HOB with foam pad & BioMax treated with Bio Spira/Dr Tims, foam bubble filter with foam soaked for at least 2 weeks in DT sump, heater, small powerhead (Hydor 240) aimed at the surface actively agitating the surface for much higher O2 exchange, Seachem Ammonia Alert Badge.
Tank lights off. Ambient room lighting only.
Feed fish with white/black worms, vitamin & fiber packed frozen fish cubes: use one cube of 6-8 different flavors like cyclops, mysis, chopped clams, seaweed, etc. with Selcon/Zoecon for at least 3 days before prophylactically treating with any meds.
Freshwater dip to check for flukes.
S-l-o-w-l-y (8-10 days) bring up copper to therapeutic levels for prophylactic treatment for 30 days: Tank lights off until therapeutic level is reached. Best to dose several times a day (AM, lunch, PM) rather than one large dose. Use a Hanna HL Copper Checker with Copper Power. Avoid Coppersafe like the plague.
Carbon & Cuprisorb to remove copper. Water changes. Observe.
General Cure 2 doses 5-7 days apart. Turn up bubbler and turn on powerhead aimed at surface to increase O2. Like GC over Prazipro. GC has Metro + Praziquantel, so you are getting the Praziquantel which kills flukes and "some" internal parasites and Metro that kills all internal parasites/worms. And the dose of Praziquantel is lower but does the job and is easier on sensitive fish.
Carbon & water changes.
Observe 10-14 days.

This exactly.

 

[4FordFamily]

If you follow a quality guide on QT and your fish die in QT anyway, it's because they unfortunately were destined to die no matter what.

This as well. It’s absolutely HORRIBLE out there right now. We are seeing disease and severity of disease and parasitic infections unlike anything we have seen before. In prevalence and severity. Often, there’s not time to treat a fish before it’s gone. This is especially bad with certain vendors, hopefully they’ll working on this. We, being @Humblefish @HotRocks myself and others. We are fighting through it but it’s continuing to worsen.

All I can say is, dumping fish in the display right now is a horrible idea, worse than it ever has been

 

[Nopy117]

So, what did you do?

 

[Biglurr54]

They are currently marinating in the qt. I'm going to monitor them for a few days see how they are handling qt and see how their health looks. If all is good and they are eating well in qt then I'll prazipro them and keep them put. If they start heading south.... I'll be back on here.

When I was picking the fish up, another guy was there and he had an issue with flukes in his tank and he removed everything and was waiting it out. It's. A nice reminder that it does and can happen.