What is a Quarantine tank

A Quarantine tank is a seperate system that allows for observation, treatment and hardening of new livestock. This is considered a serious working tool of all earnest marine hobbyists. This system only to needs to be basic, but can save you thousands. Imagine putting a sick fish or coral in your display, and then seeing a decline in the overall health of your system, to the point of loosing your livestock. Not my idea of smart reef keeping.

The advantage are numerous,

The principal scourge of marine reef fishes are virtually eliminated. Parasites (like Cryptocaryon, Amyloodinium, Glugea, and Brooklynella), bacteria and most crustacean and worm problems are solved by this procedure.

Transit disease is alleviated. Some livestock don't fair well whilst being transported, so new specimens are given rest and respite in Qt. They are likely to adjust rapidly and not be bullied by existing tankmates. Some livestock may have just recently been collected.

Your display tank is not disrupted everytime you purchase a new specimen. Imagine adding something sick, then find that you have to tear down everything in your system completely, possibly throw out your substrate, sterilize everything because of trouble that could have been avoided by QT?

There are many other things you can do with an extra tank. Think of the piece of mind knowing that you have aspare tank in the event that you may have a fish that is sick in your system. Catch the fish, place in the Qt tank and let it recover.

Components

I think that the tank should bo of a reasonable size to keep water parameters stable, so I'd recommend something over 20 gallons, but the bigger the better. Darkening the sides is a good idea, so as to not stress out new fish, corals probably doesn't need this treatment though. The water that you should add is the water from your display system, so when doing a water change, fill your QT tank. This ensures that the parameters are the same as the display tank, which is very important.

You would be best to employ a canister filter, or a hang on tank type filters, as you don't want a large volume of biomedia in a QT tank. You want to control the water chemistry in this system with a minimum of co-interaction with decor, gravel, or mass populations of micro-organisms.

Test kits to keep and eye on all parameters.

Chemically unreactive hiding places. Sections of PVC pipe, ceramic flower pots, or other devices that will grant your livestock some sense of physical refuge, but wont change your water chemistry.

Temperature control and monitoring capabilities - a heater and thermmometer.

You may require treatment chemicals, nets and a diary. Have a small calculator and note book handy to keep track of what your doing and what you have observed.

Procedure.

The objective of QT system is to treat incoming live stock in ways that reduce the likelihood of introducing disease or a weakened specimen to the display aqaurium. So the step by step procedure should be as follows,

A dip, which I'll post up after this topic, as it is a seperate topic

The livestock is closely observed daily, along with testing and adjustinging for treatment concentration (if any) Unusual apperances and behaviour are recorded. Feeding is light, and any uneaten food is siphoned out. This procedure can be used for corals, liverock and inverts, but if any medications have been used in the treatment of fish, you will need to discard the water, and clean the tank thouroughly.

Recommended time for QT is a minimum of 4 weeks. However some reefers are using 6 weeks. If any bad signs such as ich become evident, then do a dip and restart the QT period.
Any nets, buckets etc that have been used in the QT process need to be kept seperate from your display equipment. You can disinfect this equipment in iodine, methylene blue or bleach, but it's probably easier to have different gear.


Acclimation
After finishing the QT period, then the usual acclimation technique will be applied. Treat the specimen as a new addition from an outside source. Catch the fish, invert or coral, and place it in a small bowl or container, and slowly mix in water from your main system to adjust the temperature and acclimate the animal to a possible difference in temperature and water chemisty. Invert's should recieve this method as well. These animals develop a slime from transporting, so clean of the slime in a saltwater bath and QT for a period of at least 2 weeks. I usually take at least an hour, but have gone over 2 hours to adjust the water temperature and parameters.

Hyposalinity.

This is method where once the animal is added to a QT set up, the salinity is lowerd to 1.017, to kill off parasites etc. After the Qt period is over the salinity is raised very slowly to the normal levels of the main dispaly. This method is not appropriate for corals or invertebrates, and some fish species would not tolerate this method either. Although an effective means of treatment, ensure that you research the animals requirements, before employing this method. Remember, every step in this method needs to be slow, as certain animals such as star fish will not tolerate real well a shift in salinity of small amounts, so be very careful employing this method.
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Another great post, thanks

Awesome, post indeed and stuck.

Cheers. I think this is the one of the most important pieces of equipment in our hobby, and it sadden's me to see so many reefer's not applying it to their current equipment. I've unfortunately seen alot of problems lately because people didn't believe in them.