Quarantining new fish

[marounchahine]

Hi, I would like to know your opinion about wether I should have any special method for quarantining new fish, the problem that I face in lebanon is that there is only one fish store that imports marine fish, and all of the marine fish keepers know the date when he the fish stock will arrive so all of us are there on that day or the day after and all the good fish are gone in one day, so there ain't any way to get acclimated fish(it's our mistake not the lfs responsibility). I had ick brought to my display tank with every new fish and the mortality rate between new brought fish was high. Last week I had to go hypo with my display tank and remove the shrimps to a small tank I quickly set.... and that I would like to avoid in the future for it's really a mess. I have a small Quarantine tank (12g) with a wet dry filter (millenium) it's been runnig for about a year. I recently added to it a small hand made protein skimmer which is doing a good job (I put it off while treating with copper, and I do 20% water changes after treating every new fish and also i add a copper remover to avoid high levels of copper.So my tank is hypo for a month to come and it was time for fish to arrive in the lfs so I couldn't resist the temptation of getting this maroon clown that I put in my Q tank 3 days ago. It's really looking healthy and eating since the 2nd day, Should i treat it with hyposalinity, or with copper or just watch to see if it will developp white spots??? I would rather be on the severe way in quaratining than introducing new ick to my display tank in a month when i go up with the salinity and put the clown there. Thanks for any suggestion.

[Agu]

If the fish is healthy and eating I wouldn't treat it with anything. Part of the purpose of quarantine is to acclimate the fish to captivity. Once the fish is healthy and eating well in the Q tank you're less likely to have it stress and develope ick in the main tank after transfer.
jmo,
Agu

[marounchahine]

Thanks for the help, but the thing is that i always quarantine new fish for 4-5 days withiout copper treatment and i get so anxious to have them in the display tank and when their there they always have ick 3-4 days later and every time all my other fish are infected that's why I was looking for an other more severe way to quarantine them to be sure that they won't be introducing disease to my tank, especially after all the trouble i've been into going hypo for one month.
Thanks.

[billsreef]

Do a search on quarantine using the search link on the top right hand side of this page or from the RC home page. You'll come up with a lot of info on various peoples opinions on quarantine.

BTW 4-5 days is just too short. I prefer 4-6 weeks as some of the parasites that we come across can take a couple of weeks to manifest themselves to the point that we notice them.