Tropical Fish Keeping banner

Set up a Quarantine Tank Today

1K views 4 replies 3 participants last post by  Kazzy 
#1 ·
Well, I rehomed my little clown fish to a guy that really knows what he's doing (also, a very nice guy! Hope to hear from him about how the little guy settles in) so I turned his old tank into a QT. Whew! My arms are very tired from this lol!

Here's what I did:
Completely siphoned out all of the water, removed the gravel and decor and went to town cleaning it in the tub (now I have to clean the tub :roll:) using hot water and vinegar. Then I removed the filter cartridge and trashed it. Instead of buying a new cartridge I went to Dollar General and got some sponges and scrubbers. I took a sponge, soaked it in my main tank, and placed it into the main tank's filter to let it build up some bacteria. I then cut up a scrubber into small pieces. Took one piece, rolled it up, and put it into the QT filter tube thingy :lol: for some added bio-filtration. Also took a few pieces and put them in various spots in the filter. Took a bit of gravel from my main tank and put some directly into the filter, and some sprinkled on the ground. Then took what from my main tank and used it to fill the QT. Hopefully this will help everything cycle fairly quickly as I am adding fish to it tonight, but will be watching the water params VERY closely and doing frequent water changes.

Just need to add a heater tonight (running to the lfs soon to get one). Already has a powerhead in it for extra water movement. May add a homemade sponge filter, but haven't decided yet. Definitely have enough sponges for it :shock:

Any suggestions or constructive criticism is welcome!
 
See less See more
#2 ·
how did this work out for you so far. aparently the bacteria that you want die out within 24 hours if there is nothing for them to eat. So I am interested in how this effects things in QT and in hospital tanks. I wonder if it is worth keeping some real hardy and/or cheap fish in a QT tank to keep it going while not occupied.
 
#4 ·
When I don't have fish in my QT/hospital tank, I just leave it running as is and add some flakes of food every 3 or 4 days.

If I ever saw signs of disease in QTd fish, I'd break it all down after the fish was cured or dead and reseed the tank with some filter media from my 75 gallon community. Luckily, I haven't had to go down that path yet but I have jump started other new tanks with media from my healthy tank. It's good to have a back up plan :)
 
#3 ·
I actually had to add fish to it right away because I picked up some mollies. Alas the hit gave me more than I though which sent the tank into a new cycle.
 
#5 ·
Yes it is. Wish my little tank wasn't so overcrowded. I have to do a water change everyday. Hopefully I'll be able to rehome some soon.
 
This is an older thread, you may not receive a response, and could be reviving an old thread. Please consider creating a new thread.
Top