reusing MT water for QT

[sooju]

I'm trying to learn from my mistakes here, and this may or may not be a dumb question.

My fish should be coming out of hyposalinity in about four weeks. I currently have three clowns (came with tank), two bangaii cardinals, and a condei (fairy) wrasse. I'm thinking about keeping one clown, one cardinal, and the wrasse, and then adding 2-3 new fish. This time I will definitely quarantine all new arrivals. I have definitely learned the hard way that an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of daily water changes and unnecessary stress, not to mention fish loss. I'd lecture other newbies on how important QT'ing new fish is but I think this may just be one of those lessons you have to learn the hard way.

Regarding QTs, it occured to me the other day that the reason I do PWCs on the main tank is to maintain mag/cal/alk levels and keep nitrates down. Fish don't care about any of those things, so is there any reason why I couldn't use the water I remove from the main tank for water changes on the QT tank?? Is this an obvious shortcut that I'm only now figuring out?

 

[buddha_red]

ive read you need to keep clowns in pair, what kind of clowns are they?

 

[sooju]

They're false percs. I bought the tank used and the three of them have been together for 6 years and seem to get along just fine. One is big (female?) and the other two small (male?).

 

[HoCkEyGmC]

no need to keep them in pairs. cant help w/ the actual subject though. sorry. correct on the male female thing aswell. i'd keep them together but just cuz thats me. or id ditch both so the pair can remain. i just like to do that kind of stuff. IMO.

 

[Innovator]

Clowns don't need to be paired. Unless you have a sensitive species of fish that are accustomed to your water parameters or transferring fish from your main into your quarantine, I would opt for new water for water changes in your qt. Although your water parameters may be stable in your main system, it is not "fresh" and can be considered recycled due to existing wastes.

 

[buddha_red]

my bad, i thought they were social and needed to be paired thanks for the correction.

 

[sooju]

I do feel a little bad about breaking up the threesome, but I really just want one clown. Maybe I should bring all three back to the store and get a new one? Then again, there's no way the LFS is going to try to find them a home together so I'm just prolonging the inevitable.

 

[HoCkEyGmC]

ohhh i thought the 3rd was a cardinal, now i see though, so is there a pair and an outcast or do they all just kinda hang?

 

[sooju]

They all just kind of hang. Like a harem.

 

[roka64]

I agree with James. They will establish a hierarchy, the dominate (female) will be the largest and the other two (male) smaller ones (I believe they are sexed at this time) will stay that way until the female dies and then the largest of the males will change sexes and become the female.

 

[sooju]

This ended up being a post about clowns, not about using main tank water for PWCs on the quarantine tank. Anyone else want to comment on that?

 

[intimatecple]

I don't see the problem with doing that in your qt tank while it is not being used for QT but with fish in there I would personally use new salt water IMO

 

[Kurt_Nelson]

This ended up being a post about clowns, not about using main tank water for PWCs on the quarantine tank. Anyone else want to comment on that?

Good point!

I wouldn't reuse your main tank water for the QT. If there's nothing in the QT, then there's no reason to do a water change. Granted, you need to feed the empty QT to keep the bacteria alive, but the nitrates aren't going to go that high from that - unless you grossly overfeed the tank.

The point of a QT is two-fold... to serve as a separate place to isolate any diseases, but also to make it easier to keep pristine water conditions (bare bottom, smaller tank). To then reuse your water (which may have pathogens in it that you're not aware of) just seems to make that second part harder to do.

 

[Ziggy953]

This ended up being a post about clowns, not about using main tank water for PWCs on the quarantine tank. Anyone else want to comment on that?

Do not reuse the water from your main tank. The point of QT is to isolate the fish from all sources of infection, including your system as well as allowing any current infection/bacteria to be treated. Mix up new SW when doing PWCs on your QT system.

 

[sooju]

The point of QT is to isolate the fish from all sources of infection, including your system.

Good point. I was thinking about the LFS as a source of infection but my main tank could be too. I think I'm just burned out from the daily or every other day water changes in my hospital tank and trying to maintain a steady supply of PWC water at two different salinities (I have a 20G bin of 1.024 and a 10G bin of 1.009). But that's only for a few more weeks, and cutting corners is what got me into this mess in the first place!

 

[intimatecple]

Do not reuse the water from your main tank. The point of QT is to isolate the fish from all sources of infection, including your system as well as allowing any current infection/bacteria to be treated. Mix up new SW when doing PWCs on your QT system.

OK my thinking was off yesterday....now rereading what I said....listen to Ziggy and Kurt....Cause I use new salt in mine....but I also always have plenty made up having 3 tanks running