Lowered Salinity Quarentine Tank

[wheelyfeet]

My husband and I are setting up our first marine tank. It will be 90 gallon FOWL. I am also setting up a 20 gallon quarentine tank. I have read a little bit about using a lower salinity instead of copper in the quarentine tank since the fish can adapt to lower salinity but parasites cannot.

Does anyone use this method of quarentine?

Thanks,
Debra

 

[Fish Fingers]

Usually the level people lower their tanks to is not low enough to effectively kill the parasites. Tanks need to be lowered to about 1.009 S.G before the parasites will start to die. However I'm sure people are going to disagree with me on this and say that lowering the tank to around 1.018S.G is an effective method of killing parasites.

 

[Navarre]

I have tried a similar method but not for a quarentine tank.

I had an outbreak of Oodinium (Not ich) and after using any reef safe medication i could find, UB, Ozone as well only to find none of it worked I decided to take the next drastic method and treat in a Hospital tank.

The lifecycle of the parasite need to be broken so i removed the fish (cycle part 1 broken) And placed them in a QT tank and treated this with copper. This dealt with the parasite on the fish and they soon recovered well. It didnt of course deal with the parasites left back in the maintank. So I then increased the temperature to roughly 30 degrees as this will increase the speed of the parasites breding cycle and with no fish it should starve out faster (Part 2). I also reduced the SG of the tank to 1.017 which was a low as i dared go considering i still had lots of corals still in my system. I knew this would not kill the parasites on its own but my methids were to create a hostile evironment for the parasite and make it difficult to reproduce etc (part 3). I then left the maintank in this state for 5 weeks to ensure the parasite had been starved out of exsistance and during all this time i had UV and OZone running just to make sure
The result was a success and i have not had the parasite back since this day. I would not recomend lowering the SG in a QT tank as this doesnt deal with the main breeding ground of the parasite which is among thesand and rocks of the main aquarium. You could effecttvively deal with the parasite in the QT tank but if no measures are taken to attack it in the main system then you are simply putting them right back into the devils den all over again. As the main tank will not be a reef then i would lower the main tank and increase water temperature so the cycle of the parasite is sped up. Treat the QT with copper as its truely is the only really effective treatment for fish with the disease and then let the main system starve itselfout of esistance for a few weeks.

It seems a long time and a bit drastic but some diseases (Oodinium especially) will wipe out a fish in a matter of hours unlike ich that can take days. Losing your prized stock is heartbreaking and i really would not like to go through it again.

 

[ostrow]

Since you are setting up a new system I have to disagree with Navarre here. You can prevent ich from ever entering your display. I would QT every new fish if you can for a month before putting them in the display.

Correction: a month with no visible ich, and inspect each fish closely. When you see spots, start the clock over.

SG has to be 1.009 with a callibrated refractometer for hyposalinity to be effective against ich. Of course, you can start your QT at 017, no need to lower unless you see signs.

I unfortunately did not QT and now have ich basically permanently present in my display. One thing that helps is a food regimen, if you can get it. I mix Seachem's Metronidazole and Focus powder in frozen M.Y.S.I.S. (1sp, 1sp, 1tbsp), cover in selcon and garlic, half a capsule of Beta Glucan and even add some Gel-Tek px. Fish love the mix and it has worked like a charm.

Combined with hypo this works but you have to be patient.

Bottom line: QT all new fish and your display will not get ich.

 

[Navarre]

IME you can never eradicate ich for a system. Although it lives on a fish as part of its lifecycle it can be transported into your tank just as easily via a coral with somel iverock on it. If the rock has been in a system recently with fish then its just as easy to transport the parasite in. I do agree that quarenteening your system before introduction is a very good method and i recomend all who can to practise this if possible however.

 

[wheelyfeet]

Thanks for the advice about this method.

We plan on quarantining any new additions to the tank for a month before adding them to the main tank. I think I will try this method.