Should I Quaranteen?

[Eldredge]

I purchased an existing 125 gallon tank and 55 gallon sump/refugium about 6 weeks ago. I have been keeping the fish (4" Kole Tang, 2 3" clown fish, a few chromis, 2 8" engineer gobies, and a pajama cardianl) in the sump. I have a 55 gallon quaranteen tank almost ready to go. The fish had a stressful move - several hours, cold water, etc. None of them seemed to suffer any ill effects, and I saw no sign of ich. There hadn't been anything new added to the tank for at least a couple of months before I bought it. They are all doing quite well (lots of live rock).

Anyway, now I am wondering if I should quaranteen the fish or not. I was going to put the fish in quaranteen for 11 weeks and treat with hypo while the display was fish-free. Obviously, my goal is to assure that there i no ich in the system. I plan on quaranteening everything that goes into the display for 11 weeks - unless someone convinces me that this is overkill. It's time to either move the fish to quaranteen (I'm a little worried about the stress) or into the display (I'm worried about having ich in the system). Any experience or advice would be greatly appreciated.

[reefergeorge]

I would keep them in qt at least until the dt cycles. I am a huge fan of good qt practices, but I would probably skip it with the existing fish. JMO

[Eldredge]

I pretty much moved the whole system water and all, so there hasn't been any significant cycle. The soft corals in the display have all done very well with the exception of some zenia that didn't survive the move (a good thing maybe), and a ricordia that was already struggling. The sump (shere the fish are) and display are the same system. Thanks for the input.

[snorvich]

I think that there is no need to quarantine given the fish are from an existing system which has no problems.

[snorvich]

Oh, and for future reference, a sump which shares water with the display tank is not really going to effectively quarantine anything.

[Eldredge]

Originally posted by snorvich
Oh, and for future reference, a sump which shares water with the display tank is not really going to effectively quarantine anything.

Yeah, I guess I should have clarified. The 55 gallon quranteen tank is totally separate. If I quaranteen I will move the fish to the separate tank and start the "clock" when I move them. I don't really want to do this, but I would like to be sure that I don't have any ich in the display system. Thanks for the input.

[Eldredge]

To clarify. I put the fish in the sump just so that they would be easy to catch when I was ready to start quaranteen. Now I don't know if I should quranteen or just move them to the display.

[syrinx]

since you have had the fish for several weeks in your system, they have been QT`ed. If they look fine move them up. Keep the 55 running for your future needs. Odds will be that any tank will have some ich present. I once had a tank for 7 years with no new additions-and all fish had been QT`ed prior- come down with ich after a power outage.

[snorvich]

Sorry for misunderstanding. I would just move them to the display.

[Eldredge]

Thanks for the input. I am leaning towards just puting them in the display, especially after reading what Syrinx wrote. Maybe it just isn't realistic to have no ich in a system.

[tkeracer619]

I would put them strait in because they are already in it.

It would take up to 2 months to rid ich from the tank if you were to pull the fish for hypo.

Any new wet additions I would QT

[Eldredge]

Thanks tkeracer619. If I quarantine, I will leave the tank fish-free for at least 72 days. It is my understanding that ich could possibly survive for up to 72 days in a system without fish (longer than the fish need to be in hypo to rid them of it). If I was confident that I could rid the system of ich competely, I would be more willing to do that. I guess I am just wondering if it is really possible or worth the trouble to have an ich-free system.