Fish in quarantine can be fed medicated food, as needed or as a prophylactic. New animals should be observed for any trace of disease, fungus, or hitchhiker pests. A sick fish that is placed in quarantine will have the opportunity to recover from illness in a quiet, protected area where there is no competition with other tank mates, creating a much better chance of survival. The quarantine tank will allow you to treat your new or sick fish with medicines that could potentially harm your invertebrates or corals as well.

While in quarantine, new fish will learn what food is being offered without having to compete with other fish. They will become accustomed to feeding times and how the food will be offered. This will greatly increase the chance of success with the new fish because it will know what to do when feeding time arrives, how the food will enter, and what it should do it get its fair share. It is recommended that you quarantine a new fish for 4-8 weeks before introducing it to your display.

A quarantine tank can also be used for corals, which can also carry unwanted hitchhikers as well as pathogens. By placing your new specimens into quarantine, you will be able to closely monitor the coral, without putting your display tank and its inhabitants at risk. Many corals go through a tough time rigorous and traumatic shipping conditions and can use the time to recover in a separated space.

These are all very important reasons to set up a quarantine tank to protect your fish, coral, invertebrates, and your system as a whole. But, if you are not yet convinced, lets take a brief moment to play out an inevitable scenario: Lets assume that you decided to go without a quarantine tank and your shipment of new fish has just arrived. Instead of putting the new specimens in a place they can be closely monitored, you decided to place the questionable fish into the display. Unfortunately for you, the fish was carrying marine ICH and your whole system is now contaminated. What will you do now? your fish are infected, and the only proven method to treat them is with medicines that will instantly kill coral, invertebrates, and live rock. Now, you are forced to remove all your fish, which probably means emptying your tank since they will all hide, and then you still have to buy a quarantine setup to treat them. On top of that, marine ICH can remain dormant in a fish tank for 8 weeks or more. If you try to treat the fish in the system with a drug that claims to be reef safe, you will be adding more chemicals into your tank and the chances that it will do more harm than good are high.

The quarantine tank is a means of loss prevention. Please, include a setup like this with your initial start up and you will save yourself a lot of trouble in the long run as well as have happy, healthy, long living inhabitants.