Once a sick fish is in the display tank, the risk that other fish will catch the disease is real. That is when you’ll hear the hobbyist’s resolve to never let that happen again, and from that time forward they will forever use a quarantine tank. Why the change of heart? Besides having to endure the pain of removing dead bodies from the reef, they tally up the total dollars lost as further reason to never make that mistake again. It’s an expensive lesson, not to mention the loss of life.
A few years ago, I was excited to see a new product called Safety Stop come to market. It’s a double bath treatment designed to remove external parasites from any newly acquired fish. Immediately I asked for details and purchased a few packages to try it out. Things to remember:
· It’s for fish only, not inverts or corals.
· It’s not a medical treatment to cure disease
· It will take a couple of hours each session
· It’s inexpensive and easy
· One package mixes 1-gallon of each solution
· It can be used for up to 5 hours
· It doesn’t treat internal parasites / worms.
For all of you that refuse to set up a quarantine, this alternative should be your routine – no more can you make the excuse you don’t have space or time to set up a QT for that impulse buy. Keep Safety Stop on hand. Two buckets, an air pump and a timer plus this stuff and you’re equipped to limit the risk of infecting your current livestock.
For many years I always kept a quarantine tank running so it was always ready for any new fish or coral I purchased, but after a couple of major tank leaks and subsequent scrambling, I had to set up temporary vessels to hold the livestock. The quarantine tank was in the way. So I became one of you, a guy with no QT but still enamored by new fish at the local fish store that often came home with me. Every fish I’ve purchased over the past few years has gone through Safety Stop and not one fish died during the process. No disease ever appeared in my reef. Gobies, clowns, tangs, butterflies, wrasses – they came through it perfectly.
In addition, all new fish then go into the Peacemaker that is set up in my reef for about three days. This allows the fish to see each other but there’s no direct interaction. New fish typically exude a stress hormone that can trigger aggression by the current livestock, but the Peacemaker seems to curtail this completely. The fish wait in their smaller zone, are fed multiple times a day with the same foods I offer my livestock, and after a few days are released into the system. No conflict was observed between the newcomers and the old-timers whatsoever.
Safety Stop retails for $5 at most fish stores, and is sold here on Melev’s Reef as well. If you need to bathe bigger fish, simply use more packets. 1 packet treats 1-gallon, 2 packets treats 2-gallons, 3 packets treats 3-gallons and so forth. Spending a few dollars and bathing the fish in both parts over a 1.5 hour period is a great way to avoid the heartbreak of seeing your healthy fish suddenly succumb to ich, brooklynella or worse. I really don’t understand why anyone would not use this product if they refuse to QT.
And if you want to put your newly bathed fish in a quarantine tank for observation for a few weeks, even better. Do it. I still plan to set up a QT again, since it really is the best method. Sometimes I end up with a new coral and don’t have the time to dip and inspect it, so a quarantine tank gives me a temporary place to house it until I have some free time. Here’s a video showing how I use Safety Stop. See for yourself how simple it is.
Additional reading
Product review: http://www.reefaddicts.com/content.p...ew-Safety-Stop
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