The Other Way to Run a Reef Tank (no Quarantine)

[MnFish1]

Yes - I also don't feed any live foods - except for occasional LRS. I do the same as you - They only time I have had problems with fish dying is when I've gone the 'cheap way' and bought online.

Fyi - I believe in QT (observation. - no medication) - and the LFS I buy from does this as well. Since I have stuck with one local store - I have not lost a fish in years (except the tusk that jumped out). I think much of the problem with fish disease relates to stress from shipping multiple times - often over a short period of time. Also the conditions the fish were kept in during the wholesale process.

One problem with this discussion is definitions - there is Pauls definition and Lasse's definition Atolls definition, my definition - and many others - but we all talk about it as if it was one 'word' - or 'method' (or 2 methods). So - whether your tank is 4 years old of 10 years old - or 40 years old - there is no 'scientific study' - because of the great variety of fish species the people keep, the conditions they are kept in.

 

[Lasse]

their digestive systems are not designed to process that!

IMO - tangs are rather similar to other aufwuch feeders like Tropheus, Labeotropheus, Discus and other grazers of biofilm/algae/smaller invertebrates. And I´m rather sure that LLD in tangs can have the same microbial background as African bloat among African aufwuch feeders and Hole in Head in Discus (and other aufwuch feeders from south america)

IMO - This diseases is mostly caused by disorders caused by too easily digestible food in a long intestinal system which is designed for food that is difficult to digest. The active agent seems to be Spironucleus alikes and if the stomach is in disorder they can propagete and transfer further out in the body. the agent seems to be a ordinary inhabitant of these fishes normal gut/ intestine flora.

Sincerely Lasse

 

[najer]

IMO - tangs are rather similar to other aufwuch feeders like Tropheus, Labeotropheus, Discus and other grazers of biofilm/algae/smaller invertebrates. And I´m rather sure that LLD in tangs can have the same microbial background as African bloat among African aufwuch feeders and Hole in Head in Discus (and other aufwuch feeders from south america)

IMO - This diseases is mostly caused by disorders caused by too easily digestible food in a long intestinal system which is designed for food that is difficult to digest. The active agent seems to be Spironucleus alikes and if the stomach is in disorder they can propagete and transfer further out in the body. the agent seems to be a ordinary inhabitant of these fishes normal gut/ intestine flora.

Sincerely Lasse

Thanks.

 

[Lasse]

And waterlife octozin can be worth testing - I know it works with African Bloat and hole in head - but remember only with indications....

Sincerely Lasse

 

[LovesDogs_CatsRokay]

There are 79,000 views on this thread so far and we can see at least four of us run a non quarantine, non medicated tank with no diseases or losses to disease.
Us four can show that our systems work with zero losses.



People are asking for scientific studies, but scientists don't normally work with ornamental fish in home aquariums as there is no money in it. Who would fund such a study?

So we have to do our own study. Us four people have over 100 years of experience doing this. I will call this a scientific study. But to be fair, we need to hear from the other 70,000, + people who viewed this thread, the ones who quarantine and tell us how your fish are doing after 10, 15 or 30 years.

Do your fish ever get sick? Do they spawn? Do they die of old age. Asking for scientific study when regular hobbiests won't even share their results is ridiculous.

Why would anyone suggest a system if not even one person comes up with any proof at all that a quarantined or medicated fish will live even a day.
No one here has an old quarantined tank? Why Not?

How many times should I ask this as I am getting old.


What do the rest of you quiet people think? Anyone!

I will even start it, this spawning fireclown is 29 years old.
He has never been drugged or quarantined and I got him as a baby.



This copperband lived about 10 years.


These watchmans lived for 12 years and spawned for most of those years.


Here they are as old fat married fish



And this is one of them just as I got him as a baby


As did this mandarin


Yes, I have pictures of the eggs for all those fish (not the copperband) I wish

I’ll be part of your study, Paul. I don’t QT. I’ve only been in the hobby 3 years and only stopped QT’ing about 6 months to a year ago. So no old fish here but I’ll let you know how it’s going in another 10. Haven’t had any fish get sick since I stopped QTing. Have added 2 tangs, a clown, and two gobies since then. The two tangs and a couple of resident fish showed a bit of ich at first but it went away. I feed frozen LRS twice a day, a daily sheet of nori and live frozen clams on the shell once a week. I’m starting a new 300 gallon tank and not going to QT but will keep up the good feedings and I’m using a ton of mature live rock.

 

[Paul B]

Thank you LovesDogs-Cats.
But we want to hear from all those quarantined, medicated fish. How long are they living, are they ever getting sick and do they die of old age in like 15 years?

 

[MnFish1]

Thank you LovesDogs-Cats.
But we want to hear from all those quarantined, medicated fish. How long are they living, are they ever getting sick and do they die of old age in like 15 years?

Paul - can you define for everyone what YOU mean by quarantine, medicated fish?

 

[LovesDogs_CatsRokay]

Thank you LovesDogs-Cats.
But we want to hear from all those quarantined, medicated fish. How long are they living, are they ever getting sick and do they die of old age in like 15 years?

You should post a new poll. “What’s the age of your oldest fish that has been treated with copper?” Less than 5, 5-10, or greater than 10

 

[Paul B]

Good Idea, but it will become an argument as anything that mentions quarantine produces an argument.

 

[LovesDogs_CatsRokay]

Good Idea, but it will become an argument as anything that mentions quarantine produces an argument.

That’s true. Bummer.

 

[Stigigemla]

@Lasse. I do actually become some of the fishes from the same exporter in the Philippines and the quality is the same.
The januari import was some losses but in april 92% was alive after 8 days. I believe it had to do with a 6 hour truck transport in the cold night in Sweden. The snails was exeptionally good.
Today it goes via a transshipper in France.

 

[ingchr1]

Perusing through this thread, several questions.

How does one confirm that their fish has died of old age and not some disease or parasite? There are visible diseases and parasites, but what about diseases and parasites that can't be seen?

Are the fish living full lives compared to living in the ocean or compared to other fish living in captivity? If compared to the ocean, where can one find the expected life span of thier particular fish in the ocean?

If a fish goes through some type of quarantine, why would it have no immunity? Do the medications remove all immunity from the fish? Or is it the removal of the parasites themselves that removes the immunity? Combination of both?

Why can't the parasites be removed/disease treated while maintaining the health of the fish through proper feeding and dosage or tank transfer (where applicable)?

 

[Lasse]

How does one confirm that their fish has died of old age and not some disease or parasite? There are visible diseases and parasites, but what about diseases and parasites that can't be seen?

Are the fish living full lives compared to living in the ocean or compared to other fish living in captivity? If compared to the ocean, where can one find the expected life span of thier particular fish in the ocean?

Of Course you can´t say that age is the exact reason for the death - it is rather clear for the moment if you look around and see was happen. But age is a contributing factor. There is a huge difference Between living for some years and most fishes natural lifespan. And diseases and predation is limited factors in the Ocean too

For many species the expected lifespan have been estimated with help of the birth certificate.

Just kidding - there is a way of estimate age with help of their otoliths and in many species the length - age relationship is determined. One example.

If a fish goes through some type of quarantine, why would it have no immunity? Do the medications remove all immunity from the fish? Or is it the removal of the parasites themselves that removes the immunity? Combination of both?

A tricky question but as usually - there is no persons that says that observation QT with good aquarium equipment and gradual acclimation (over a week or more) to the fauna of the DT can´t be done. The resistance applies to the use of prophylactic treatment with drugs. The process of immunity includes exposure to the pathogenic microorganism / parasite (or part of it) on order for the immune system to build a specific defence against the microorganism / parasite. Per definition - if you do not will be exposed (or get a vaccination) for a microorganism / parasite - you will not build a specific defence against it.

Another problem is that most persons that recommend extended chemical prophylactic does this because they want to eradicate the cause of diseases in general terms. They believe that they can create a environment free of every thinkable possible microorganism/parasite that can turn to be pathogenic. It is maybe possible for a while but the consequence of this will be a population without any specific immune system that is ready to fight microorganisms/parasites that turn from being friendly to be pathogenic. Most disease in the aquatic environment is caused by facultative pathogenic organisms. To be facultative means that the relationship between microorganism/parasite and host is normal neutral because of the hosts immune system and depressed pathogenic ability of the microorganism/parasite. If this relationship changes -> disease. If the fish have had no chance to acquire a specific immune response to some microorganism/parasites - first exposure to enough microorganism / parasite will then cause a disease - however an exposure of low amount of these microorganism / parasite - low enough that the unspecific defence system handle them - during time will give the specific immune system time to develop specific antibodies.

TTM is a very good methode both for treatment and prophylactic treatment with fish in good condition.

Sincerely Lasse

 

[richarddeweerd]

I never have done QT too, not in my former 35 gallon and not in my current 8 gallon nano. I've never lost a single fish to a disease (in 8 years time). I do get fresh seawater via my LFS for my water changes.

 

[Paul B]

How does one confirm that their fish has died of old age and not some disease or parasite?

If you are interested, I wrote this about fish dying of old age;
It's actually very easy to tell. We also know about how long some fish live because we can't find many that lived longer than that.

How to Tell if a Marine Fish Is Dying of Old Age

We aquarists try very hard to keep our animals alive as long as possible for a few reasons. The first is that we are caring people and don’t want to see them hurt. The second is that our spec…

www.saltwatersmarts.com

I got this watchman gobi as a pair and I have posted many pictures of her as a baby, adolescent and adult. I also posted their many batches of eggs. Here she is 12 years later dying of old age. I removed her so the other fish wouldn't pick on her. On "necropsy" she had no parasites and her gills were clear.
Her organs were also healthy looking.




Most of the fish we keep live between 10-15 years. Clownfish can live into their 30s (I have one now which is 29) smaller fish like smaller gobies, bleenies, dragonettes etc, average about 10 years.

Tangs and copperbands can live between 12-20 years and pipefish and seahorses live about 6 years.
Bangai Cardinals have one of the shortest lifespans of about 4 or 5 years.

Of course these estimates are a guess based mostly on my experiences (and things I know from these forums) because I have kept these fish that long and if even one fish lives to those ages, we know their lifespan is at least that.

If compared to the ocean, where can one find the expected life span of thier particular fish in the ocean?

Of course we can't know that. But from SCUBA diving for over 50 years I am sure the majority of fish get eater way before that lifespan and I doubt any fish lives out it's entire lifespan in the sea.

If a fish goes through some type of quarantine, why would it have no immunity? Do the medications remove all immunity from the fish?

Quarantine in itself does not remove any immunity. It's the time the fish is quarantined. This has been posted numerous times. If an organism, including us is kept away from pathogens for a certain period of time, which varies greatly between species, it will "gradually" lose it's immunity. That is a well known fact and the reason we get booster shots for diseases. We need an occasional meeting with the pathogen weather it be a parasite, worm, bacteria or virus/ to stay immune from it.
That is also why when I go to Mexico, I get sick when the Mexicans don't get sick.
In Viet Nam I had to take anti Malaria pills every day or I was almost guaranteed to get malaria, but the native people didn't have any pills and they looked mighty healthy to me.

Extended quarantine (no one knows how long that is) will render that fish susceptible to any pathogen it ever encounters for the rest of it's life.

As for medication, it depends on the medicine. Most fish medications will destroy a fishes gut bacteria, even copper. The fish, like us depends on it's gut bacteria to make appropriate immune response to the pathogen.

So if a fish is quarantined and medicated, it's future survival is in jeopardy because if a disease organism is ever introduced, that fish can not fight it off and more medication has to be used.

This is the reason that for about 20 years I have been asking for anybody to show an old tank of quarantined, medicated fish that have never been sick and only die of old age. So far I have not found even one.

I have also asked many times for someone to come to my house with a fish infected with ich, velvet or anything else and put it in my tank to prove my theory. No one volunteered. Now that proposal is off the table as I feel after almost fifty years, I don't have anything more to prove.

Why can't the parasites be removed/disease treated while maintaining the health of the fish through proper feeding and dosage or tank transfer (where applicable)?

Because of what I just said, they need the parasites to stay immune to them.
Fully quarantined or medicated fish will never be as healthy as normal fish with it's full immunity.
Just like us when we get treated for cancer and they kill off our white blood cells. We have to stay in isolation because anything, even a cold will easily kill us.

Eventually they strengthen our immunity before we are allowed to go home, but it is timely, dangerous involved process.
A fish can re gain it's immunity, but not in a tank where everything is quarantined so no new pathogens are introduced.

IMO a healthy, normal, natural tank is one where parasites, bacteria and viruses happily live alongside fish just as they have been doing in the sea for millions of years without harming each other.

The parasites can sample a little skin, the fishes immune system (which is mostly in it's slime) will discourage that parasite from taking to much and limiting it's reproductive system in that tank.
Bacteria feed on parasites and viruses feed on parasites and bacteria keeping the organism as healthy as it was in the sea.
Remember, in the sea the fish is surrounded by parasites and they eat parasites in their meal at each feeding.

We humans are full of parasites yet they do us no harm as long as we are healthy

 

[ingchr1]

It would be interesting to have a R2R questionnaire sent out. The R2R community is a large population that could be leveraged for data collection, on this topic or others.

Are the tanks in this thread representative of a majority of no quarantine tanks out there or are they the exception. If the exception, how do the lives of fish in those other no quarantine tanks compare to quarantined tanks?

If I had to guess, a majority of people (on this forum or not) are not quarantining. Yet the hobby apparently has a high turnover rate. Can it be assumed that a majority get out after a tank crash? If so, how do the number of tank crashes compare between no quarantine and quarantine tanks?

The questionnaire could have questions such as:

• How long have you been in the hobby?
• Do you quarantine?
• What is your quarantine method?
• How long have you had each of your fish and what type are they?
• Have you ever had a tank crash?

 

[Sallstrom]

Here’s an ich-magnet at work who hasn’t been medicated or quarantined and is still going strong after about 15 years I haven’t seen any parasites for a couple of years now. Perhaps they gave up.

Quarantine or no quarantine at public aquariums differ a lot depending on resources, experience and space I think. The places I’ve worked at haven’t had the opportunity to quarantine everything. But have had mostly good results anyway.

 

[WVNed]

My poor diseased fish I was too lazy to quarantine. Thank goodness I am lucky.

 

[kkelly007]

It would be interesting to have a R2R questionnaire sent out. The R2R community is a large population that could be leveraged for data collection, on this topic or others.

Are the tanks in this thread representative of a majority of no quarantine tanks out there or are they the exception. If the exception, how do the lives of fish in those other no quarantine tanks compare to quarantined tanks?

If I had to guess, a majority of people (on this forum or not) are not quarantining. Yet the hobby apparently has a high turnover rate. Can it be assumed that a majority get out after a tank crash? If so, how do the number of tank crashes compare between no quarantine and quarantine tanks?

The questionnaire could have questions such as:

• How long have you been in the hobby?
• Do you quarantine?
• What is your quarantine method?
• How long have you had each of your fish and what type are they?
• Have you ever had a tank crash?

It would be interesting to have a R2R questionnaire sent out. The R2R community is a large population that could be leveraged for data collection, on this topic or others.

Are the tanks in this thread representative of a majority of no quarantine tanks out there or are they the exception. If the exception, how do the lives of fish in those other no quarantine tanks compare to quarantined tanks?

If I had to guess, a majority of people (on this forum or not) are not quarantining. Yet the hobby apparently has a high turnover rate. Can it be assumed that a majority get out after a tank crash? If so, how do the number of tank crashes compare between no quarantine and quarantine tanks?

The questionnaire could have questions such as:

• How long have you been in the hobby?
• Do you quarantine?
• What is your quarantine method?
• How long have you had each of your fish and what type are they?
• Have you ever had a tank crash?

I would LOVE a survey like this, assuming honest answers. I'm getting back into the hobby after a 12 year hiatus and am 3 weeks into my DT cycle. I have also been cycling a 20g long QT, but have gotten so many mixed messages on the need to quarantine, including the additional stress that quarantining has on a fish and the risk of overtreating with copper, etc., that I'm not even sure I'm going to QT, and maybe just leave the tank up as a hospital tank. I know risk of prevention = lb of cure, but I'm really confused. Add to this the fact that my LFS is super clean and run by a husband & wife who go to great lengths to ensure their livestock is healthy prior to selling (recognizing that there are zero guarantees). They are not against individual quarantining, just do not actively promote it.

 

[Paul B]

Paul - can you define for everyone what YOU mean by quarantine, medicated fish?

Quarantine means any time spent away from other fish, diseases, parasites etc. But in this discussion I think we should go with what many people feel is the time period to keep fish separate so the parasites go through their cycle and die.
I hear 72 days a lot so lets say two months.

Medication means just that. If you buy a new fish and put it in anything besides seawater, be it Prizapro, copper, formalin, metheline blue, quinicrine hydrocloride or anything else that comes in a bottle. I don't feel fresh water dipping is that bad because I also have to occasionally do that for flukes, but only for like 2 minutes, possibly 3 if the fish is not to stressed. Then the fish goes right into my reef.
I rarely do that, but occasionally even though I know it severely stresses the fish.

I feel a fish should be acclimated for maybe 20 or 30 minutes depending on the salinity and temperature of the water in the bag. If the temperature and salinity is the same, 5 minutes of acclimation should be enough.

Remember, very important, in a very new tank, no matter if you throw the fish right in or quarantine for a year, you will most likely have problems as fish hate new water with new rocks. Bacteria needs months to settle down and make the tank healthy and stable enough to allow any system to work. It is what it is.

OK someone who doesn't mind argueing with like everyone, put up a poll.