How many prefer to leave fish with ich in the display tank?

[nextlevel808]

I always qt a fish before adding it in main tank no matter what.

[zygote2k]

Scenario:  Main display is stocked with mature fish valued at $20,000.  A new addition is scheduled to arrive from Live Aquaria, Blue Zoo, or insert your favorite vendor.  

 

Do you quarantine the new additions or add directly to the main display?

Sounds like a system that either has room for a QT system or pays for QT'd fish. Not a realistic tank for this argument.

[SunWyrm]

I think the original arguement would be if I had an ich outbreak in my established 300g, do I remove all my fish and treat them outside of the display?

My answer, no, I'd feed them good food (as always) and let them ride it out. At that point you know that your fish are better off in their home, not a hospital tank.

Good food, water quality, and a low stress environment can heal a lot of things. 
 

[ridetheducati]

Sounds like a system that either has room for a QT system or pays for QT'd fish. Not a realistic tank for this argument.

I must be out of touch.  If someone does not have room for a QT, they should downsize their main display.  See that five gallon bucket sitting in the corner, that could be a QT.

 

I understand the question as the system is contaminated, what do you do, remove the fish or deal with it.  Many hobbyist deal with it because of the level of effort required to right the ship.  Some people drive without wearing their seat belts; I bet that train of thought would change after a serious accident.

 

My point is apply your own risk management strategy based on your needs.  Loosing $50 worth of fish is easier to accept than loosing $10,000 worth of livestock.  Chances are most hobbyist would not be so cavalier when a serious financial or emotional investment at stake.  I see it all the time in the LFS or online, a $50 fish is sick and dies, the hobbyist says "oh well, just buy another one".    

[paul b]

 

 Chances are most hobbyist would not be so cavalier when a serious financial or emotional investment at stake.  I see it all the time in the LFS or online, a $50 fish is sick and dies, the hobbyist says "oh well, just buy another one".    

You are assuming, like many people do that quarantining is the best method, and it may be.  But there are other methods besides quarantining and many, or even the majority of older systems have learned the secret.  Quarantining is only one way to go but not the only way.  And the other way is not to just dump fish into your tank and go out for pizza.  There is more to it than that but I would rather not get into it as I have posted it for years.  Quarantine if you want.  But learn what else you can do and try to understand what is better for the fish.

[zygote2k]

My 6" Tang has ick and I have a 5g bucket in the corner. I'll take it out of the 300g tank that it's most comfortable in and place it in the 5g bucket and saturate the water with chemicals. Hmmm, what's more likely to kill the fish?

 

Ick is simply no more likely to kill an otherwise healthy fish than a cold does in a typical healthy human being. If the fish is happy and swimming around and eating but has ick, why worry about it?

 

In some of the large systems that I work on, it's nearly impossible to catch and remove a sick fish due to the sheer amount of rockwork.

In my opinion, it's just better to buy healthy pre-quarantined fish and place them in the display rather than setting up a QT tank onsite or in some other location.