quarantine tank question

[Gyration]

Ok, I have bought a aquascene 12 gallon eclipse tank as my quarantine tank. Well it's not here yet, but one question came up, after I cycle it, I can put fish in it. And than move the fish to my bigger tank. But once I remove the fish and I am finished with the quarantine tank, how do I keep the tank cycled? Or do I have to recycle the tank everytime I want to use it? Or can I keep say, 8 or 9 neon tetras in there just to keep the bacteria going, so that I don't have to cycle the tank everytime I want to use it? What are some ideas?

 

[Apocalypse_Gold]

I would recommend keeping one of the smaller pl*cos (a common pl*co will outgrow the tank too fast). This would keep any algae in check and they produce alot of waste for their size.

 

[Fishalicious]

Well, if you're using the tank as a quarantine tank for sick fish too, I dont think the pleco would enjoy the needless exposure to medications to treat the other fish(es). If you're using it simply to quarantine "bullies" or new arrivals, the pleco would be the better idea imo.

 

[Voodoo Chilli]

If this is going to be a QT tank AND a hospital tank- you'll want to tear it down and sterilize everything after each use. You'll have to do daily-to-bi-daily water changes to keep the ammonia and nitrites down during use, since it won't be cycled.

If it's to be a QT tank only- try adding some MTS: they'll keep your bio-filter fed and you won't have to worry about what to do with extra fish when the time comes to use the tank.

 

[thartley]

Someone suggested to me that I could keep a Betta in the QT to keep it cycled. Then when I need to quarantine new fish, move the Betta into a glass container (similar to how they're kept at the LFS) to keep it from possibly catching anything from the new fish. Once quarantine is over, move the Betta back into the QT.

 

[TankGirl]

That's a typical way to do things, tharthley, for sure. Kindof efficient.

What I do is, like Voodoo suggested, tear down the whole thing every time. I have sponge filters running on my big tanks, so when I need to set up a Q-tank or hospital tank I have a filter packed with tons of bacteria ready to go. When you are treating with meds you often change the water often anyway prior to dosing, so the cycle is not such an issue. I like to sterilize everything after I have been treating for illness and after I have quarrantined new fish, so I do that and pop the sterilized sponge filter back into one of the main tanks to get saturated with bacteria again.

An Eclipse system is trickier but you can keep the biowheel in another tank, tucked away behind some plants (I do this too- you can imagine what my tanks look like with all this biomedia-in-waiting) and it will help remarkably well when you are ready to use the 12-gal.

 

[Gyration]

Well my QT tank will be just a QT tank for my 65 gallon tank. And possibly a baby tank, where I can put pregnant ones in there to have babies. I don't think I will be using it as a hospital tank anytime in the near future. Putting some pleco's in there sounds like a cool idea, to keep the bio-cycle going. I might just do that and that will take care of the algae's for me.

Tks for all the help guys and gals.