Abhishek wrote:I keep my fish in a quarantine tank, de-worm them and after 7 days introduce them to the main tank.
Nothing else I do.
I did a little bit of reading. When you say you deworm them, what exactly do you use and how do you administer them?
I was told at the lfs, Praziquantel is recommended for deworming. I read flubendazole is good at ridding internal parasites, while many stress on the importance of adding garlic to a fish's diet in QT alongwith Aq. salt...
I would like to share few things regarding the necessity and idea behind quarantine. While agreeing that this is not so easy for hobbyists, it has great dividends if you can device and implement a QT protocol of your own.
All fishses will be exposed to some sort of external/internal parasites, bacteria etc, there is a chance that your current stock of fishes are not exposed and are not immune to these, so there is a high risk that introducing new stock will create diseases in your present stock. QT is done to eliminate this process.
In QT fishes are first treated for external parasites, then internal parasites and also cleaning any gill issues. Scientific QT is very long, as hobbyists you can try these things.. This is just an abstract, kindly refer online resources for details, please feel free to ask questions,
1. Keep a bare bottom tank with only aeration(filtration is not necessary, as medicines will crash filters, also you need to do several water changes), tweak PH for the kind of fishes you are using it for.
2. Introduce the fish, make sure no bag water enters the tank, you can first apply any medicine for external parasites and salt(add salt only to fishes who can tolerate them), please research before using medicines and stick to the recommended dosage.
3. Do a water change after 24 hours and feed the fishes, you can add meds for internal parasites (3 days continues with 50% wc daily)
4. check for any signs of diseases for next 2 weeks (should siphon the bottom every other day, and 50% wc once a week), and apply medicine only if necessary, you can acclimate the new fishes to your feeds in these two weeks and add them to your regular stock after 2 weeks.
Regarding Meth.Blue, I should say the person only gave you half information, meth blue dont have any medicinal properties, it increases oxygen and act against fungus.
I have not added names of med's as not all brands are available every where, I would like to add, be cautious while handling fish medicines.
