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While at first thought quarantining your newly purchased fish or invertebrate may seem to be a royal pain, this simple procedure can, in the long run, save you from a number of problems that could endanger the well being of the pet animals already present in your system. One should assume that all fish, either captive bred or (especially) wild are carriers of one form of nasty pathogen or another. From bacteria to protozoa's to viruses...any or all may be waiting to cause you grief. Why take the chance of introducing something like that into an already established system when a simple quarantine can take care of this potential problem. I know...I know... you don't have room to set up another fish tank. Well, in most cases all you need is about 240 square inches of floor space...which just happens to be the size of a 10 gallon tank. Nor need the tank be left up and running all the time. It can be set up at a moments notice to hold that one of a kind animal you have had your eye on. And, you don't need all the fancy bells and whistles you would expect to find on a permanent set up. In fact, all you'll need is listed in below.

MATERIALS NEEDED FOR A SIMPLE QUARANTINE TANK:

10 gallon tank (or larger, if need be)
cover (preferable with light)
2' of 2" PVC pipe cut to 6" lengths (for fish hiding places)
heater and thermometer
air pump
biologically active sponge filter
ammonia test kit (fresh and salt water)
AmQuel or similar product
net
antibacterial medicated fish food
anti-parasitic medicated fish food
citrated copper (for marine fish)
copper test kit (for marine fish)
malachite green (for freshwater fish)
crushed oyster shell or calcareous gravel

As you can see, not much is needed to get started, In fact the most costly item on the list is the canopy and light. This need not be an expensive fluorescent light. An incandescent fixture will do here. How do you start? Quite simple. You will be setting up your tank the same way you'd set up any tank, with the exception of painting the OUTSIDE bottom of the tank black (note that NO substrate is used in the quarantine tank, hence the need to black out the bottom). This will give the fish the illusion of a solid bottom, and place them more at ease (with fish, as with humans, psychological well being goes a long way to aiding with physiological well being). Next, place the tank on a nice sturdy, level surface (a stand made for this purpose, preferably), and fill it with 10 gallons of water from your already established aquarium tank. Add the heater, PVC pipe pieces, a small amount (a handful is usually good) of crushed oyster shell or calcareous gravel in a mesh bag (to provide some buffering) and the biologically active sponge filter and..VIOLA!...a quarantine tank is born! "Hey!", you might say, "Where do I get a biologically active sponge filter?" There are several options here. Perhaps your local dealer can sell you an active sponge filter (a note to dealers here: Since it is a good idea to have auxiliary aeration in your systems, in any event, why not utilize sponge filters? This way, when your customer needs an active sponge filter, you have plenty on hand to sell). Failing this, perhaps a fellow hobbyist can help you out. However, the easiest thing to do, IMO, is to always have a sponge filter on hand. This is easily accomplished by placing a working sponge filter (or two) in your sump or directly in your tank (hidden behind some decorations so that it is not visible when viewing the tank). After 4 to 6 weeks you will have an active sponge filter! After the quarantine period is over, all you need do is remove the sponge filter from the quarantine tank, rinse it under hot water, and place it back into your tank/sump for bacterial re-colonization. Really, what could be simpler? O.K., now the tank is up an running. All environmental parameters check out (so far). What next? You'll want to add the fish, of course. Follow whatever acclimation procedures you normally follow (which, in my case, consists of netting the fish from the bag to the tank while yelling "ACCLIMATE!"). NEVER dump bag water into your quarantine or main tank. Always net the fish from the bag. Allow the fish 24 hours to settle in before starting treatment.

FRESHWATER QUARANTINE PROCEDURE

PROCEDURE For those of you quarantining freshwater fish, please read on. For those dealing with marine species, please skip down three paragraphs. For freshwater fishes, the quarantine procedure is quite simple. First, you will want to feed your fish an antibacterial medicated food twice a day for 14 days. Feed as much as the fish will eat in 2 minutes or so at each feeding. Bacterial disorders are the most common cause of death in fishes, and it pays to give a preventative treatment here. If you are dealing with wild-caught fishes, you will also want to supplement this with an antiprotozoal medicated food (antibacterial diet at one feeding and antiprotozoal at the other) to rid these fish of whatever intestinal parasites they may be carrying. Next, you will want to treat the fish with malachite green. I know some of you must be shaking your heads, saying that malachite green will kill some freshwater species. NONSENSE! When dosed correctly, malachite green is safe for even the most so-called sensitive species. The dose I use, and have been successful with, is 0.05 PPM malachite green for three treatments, one every other day. At this level, your fish should not experience malachite sensitivity. Of course, dosing at 0.05 PPM means doing more than adding one drop per gallon. To figure out the correct amount of liquid to add, you take the concentration of malachite green listed on the bottle (in percent), and convert it to milligrams per milliliters ( 10 percent= 1000 milligrams/100 milliliters of water). Divide the milligrams per milliliters by the final concentration. This will give you the results in milliliters/liters. To convert to gallons, divide the number of liters by 3.8 . For example, we have a 10 gallon tank, want a final concentration of 0.05 PPM (or 0.05 mg/l. It's interchangeable for our purposes), and we are using a 0.75% malachite green solution. So...0.75% = 7.5 mg/milliliter. 7.5 mg/ml divided by 0.05 PPM (or mg/l) = 1 ml per 40 gallons. Since 1 milliliter is about 16 drops, we will need 1/4 of that, or 4 drops per 10 gallons of a 0.75% malachite green solution. Now for the kicker: most malachite green based medications advise ONE DROP PER GALLON of a 0.75% solution. This works out to 2.5 times the amount actually needed. No wonder some hobbyists lose fish when using malachite green: they have severely overdosed! Anyway..to continue... You want to dose at least three times, once every other day for three treatments, all the while feeding the medicated food(s). While the malachite treatment will last only six days, you really want to continue the quarantine for another eight days. If after this time period no obvious signs of disease are present, you can safely add the fish to your established tank. If obvious signs of another illness show themselves (for example, a lesion caused by an external bacterial infection), you will need to treat that as well, in conjunction with the malachite treatment. Please note that malachite green, being an organic dye, will stain clothing, skin, the silicon seal in your tank...almost anything! If fabrics or silicon have become stained, you will need to live with it since this stain is not removable. Malachite green inadvertently gotten on skin should be rinsed off as soon as possible. The stain left behind will wear off within a few days. During this 14 day period, you will want to monitor the ammonia level in the tank, and take appropriate actions if you notice an increase. If the ammonia level is slight, the addition of AmQuel or similar product will take care of it. Just be aware that AmQuel will lOver the pH of the system, and constant use can bring about pH readings of 4 or lOver! Hence the use of crushed oyster shell or calcareous gravel in the tank: it will help in maintaining an acceptable pH range. If the ammonia level continues to rise, a water change (up to 50%) is in order. Remember to redose the appropriate amount of medication after the water change.

MARINE AQUARIUM QUARANTINE

PROCEDURE For those of you quarantining freshwater fish, please read on. For those dealing with marine species, please skip down three paragraphs. For freshwater fishes, the quarantine procedure is quite simple. First, you will want to feed your fish an antibacterial medicated food twice a day for 14 days. Feed as much as the fish will eat in 2 minutes or so at each feeding. Bacterial disorders are the most common cause of death in fishes, and it pays to give a preventative treatment here. If you are dealing with wild-caught fishes, you will also want to supplement this with an antiprotozoal medicated food (antibacterial diet at one feeding and antiprotozoal at the other) to rid these fish of whatever intestinal parasites they may be carrying. Next, you will want to treat the fish with malachite green. I know some of you must be shaking your heads, saying that malachite green will kill some freshwater species. NONSENSE! When dosed correctly, malachite green is safe for even the most so-called sensitive species. The dose I use, and have been successful with, is 0.05 PPM malachite green for three treatments, one every other day. At this level, your fish should not experience malachite sensitivity. Of course, dosing at 0.05 PPM means doing more than adding one drop per gallon. To figure out the correct amount of liquid to add, you take the concentration of malachite green listed on the bottle (in percent), and convert it to milligrams per milliliters ( 10 percent= 1000 milligrams/100 milliliters of water). Divide the milligrams per milliliters by the final concentration. This will give you the results in milliliters/liters. To convert to gallons, divide the number of liters by 3.8 . For example, we have a 10 gallon tank, want a final concentration of 0.05 PPM (or 0.05 mg/l. It's interchangeable for our purposes), and we are using a 0.75% malachite green solution. So...0.75% = 7.5 mg/milliliter. 7.5 mg/ml divided by 0.05 PPM (or mg/l) = 1 ml per 40 gallons. Since 1 milliliter is about 16 drops, we will need 1/4 of that, or 4 drops per 10 gallons of a 0.75% malachite green solution. Now for the kicker: most malachite green based pet medications advise ONE DROP PER GALLON of a 0.75% solution. This works out to 2.5 times the amount actually needed. No wonder some hobbyists lose fish when using malachite green: they have severely overdosed! Anyway..to continue... You want to dose at least three times, once every other day for three treatments, all the while feeding the medicated food(s). While the malachite treatment will last only six days, you really want to continue the quarantine tank for another eight days. If after this time period no obvious signs of disease are present, you can safely add the fish to your established tank. If obvious signs of another illness show themselves (for example, a lesion caused by an external bacterial infection), you will need to treat that as well, in conjunction with the malachite treatment. Please note that malachite green, being an organic dye, will stain clothing, skin, the silicon seal in your tank...almost anything! If fabrics or silicon have become stained, you will need to live with it since this stain is not removable. Malachite green inadvertently gotten on skin should be rinsed off as soon as possible. The stain left behind will wear off within a few days. During this 14 day period, you will want to monitor the ammonia level in the tank, and take appropriate actions if you notice an increase. If the ammonia level is slight, the addition of AmQuel or similar product will take care of it. Just be aware that AmQuel will lOver the pH of the system, and constant use can bring about pH readings of 4 or lOver! Hence the use of crushed oyster shell or calcareous gravel in the tank: it will help in maintaining an acceptable pH range. If the ammonia level continues to rise, a water change (up to 50%) is in order. Remember to redose the appropriate amount of medication after the water change.