The problem with LFSs

[sen5241b]

So I'm in a LFS that has nothing but marine livestock. Looks like an excellent store with great reputation. There's a green chromis for a lousy 8 bucks, its peaceful, reef safe and nice. I try to find someone to bag it and then a big blue tang comes out of the LR and starts madly rubbing himself back and forth on the rock really fast. Ich or some parasite?

I'm thinking most LFSs don't have the time & money to quarantine all fish (let alone all livestock). But what does an LFS do when they have ich throughout their system?

 

[Bifferwine]

The LFSs where I live have separate "for sale" tank systems for fish and inverts. Copper is run continuously through the fish tanks, and since the inverts are on a separate system, no need to worry about them. As for the inverts, at my LFS the corals are dipped for pests before they're put up for sale. No need to quarantine those guys, and it'd be impossible to dip or treat non-coral inverts like shrimp, snails, crabs, etc. so why quarantine those anyways?

Maybe other stores don't do this, but whenever you buy a new fish, you have to assume it has ich I think. You really can't rely on someone else to take care of things for you, before you buy an animal. My LFS will specifically tell you when you buy a fish from them to be careful not to get any bag water into the tank, since it is copper treated. But short of them outright telling you this, you can't just assume that every LFS quarantines or treats their livestock before they sell it.

 

[yote]

At the store I help at.We treat every single one of the fish tanks.Their kept in hypo-salinity for the fish that dont handle copper to well.We also keep a couple of cleaner wrasses to help them along.Every tank has its own filtration.Then we have QTs set up in the back for fish thats extremely sick where they can be treated aggressively.

 

[acemow]

I really like the folks at my LFS...however, we disagree on some things like they believe you only need to quarantine fish. I follow another belief: if it's wet, quarantine it. I've seen fish with ich in with corals and anemones that were being sold. I quarantine everything.

 

[dustin_P74]

you dont need to quarantine: snails, crabs, shrimp because there is no treatment for them

 

[Smitty]

My lfs also run two systems...all the fish tanks have copper and the inverts and corals do not...they also advise you after a fish purchase that the water has copper...I never quarantine and place the livestock directly in my tanks because all their fish are treated...like mentioned also, the corals are dipped before going in any sale tank, and live rock is cured for eight months before being put out for sale...not all lfs practice this, thats why I only buy from just that one...I actually drive past two other lfs, just to go to that one...I trust them!

 

[ndepratt]

8 bucks for a chromis!?!?!?! stores around here sell them for 3.99.

My loan got turned down on the LFS I was going to open.... which explains my internet business :(

btw I find too many LFS's know how to keep a fish alive just long enough to sell them... and it doesn't have to be that way!

But what do I know... my website has gotten me barred from all the LFS's in KC :P (true story... something about my prices I believe :P)

 

[dustin_P74]

But what do I know... my website has gotten me barred from all the LFS's in KC :P (true story... something about my prices I believe :P)

well once you start getting the installation/servicing of tanks up and going you can take even more of their business from them just to spite them

 

[yote]

But what do I know... my website has gotten me barred from all the LFS's in KC :P (true story... something about my prices I believe :P)

With your prices and the quality of the equipment you sale,I doubt you'll have much trouble.As your service grows,then work the store into it.:D

Since being laid off,I been dabbling into a little tank maintance.Its fun and it pays.If I keep doing it,I'm gonna start asking customers if I can photograph their tanks.

 

[daugherty]

I really like the folks at my LFS...however, we disagree on some things like they believe you only need to quarantine fish. I follow another belief: if it's wet, quarantine it. I've seen fish with ich in with corals and anemones that were being sold. I quarantine everything.

inverts and corals cannot host ich

 

[Rcpilot]

There is one LFS here that QT each fish for about 3 weeks. They have several thousand gallons just dedicated to QT the new arrivals. I don't buy fish though, so it doesn't make any difference to me. I'm mostly into corals and don't really care about fish a whole lot.

 

[sen5241b]

Inverts ,may not be affected by ich but they can carry it.

 

[Bifferwine]

Inverts ,may not be affected by ich but they can carry it.

I notice that you keep bringing this point up, and I wonder why, since it's immaterial to any discussion regarding ich. First off, I've never seen any proof of this. Even if you google it, there are articles here and there that say it's suspected that inverts can carry ich. Nothing that says it's been shown or proven.

Second, there's nothing you can do about it if they are carrying ich. You can't treat them with any ich medications, and if you quarantine them, there's no way to know if they are carrying a hitch hiking ich organism or not. There are no tests available to see if your new snail has an ich hitch hiker or not. And if there was, what are you going to do about it? Nothing. By this same reasoning, you cannot know if your sand or live rock is carrying it. So what? Are you suggesting that every piece of rock, sand and invert that is placed in our tank should be quarantined? If so, what are you going to find out from that? What are you going to wait to see? Since inverts never get ich, you are going to quarantine your new shrimp and snails and wait for...what? Are you suggesting that every single piece of rock, sand and invert is treated for ich? If so, good luck keeping a reef tank.

I'm just very very confused as to why you keep bringing this point up and where you are getting your information from to back up your statements...

The truth is, instead of being so concerned about one ich organism riding in on the shell of your snail, if you keep up your good water quality and keep your fish healthy, IT WON'T MATTER!!! Your fish will be fine! You'd be hard pressed to find anyone that has completely 100% eradicated ich from their tank. The reason people don't see it in their tanks is because their fish don't have outbreaks.

 

[ndepratt]

The truth is, instead of being so concerned about one ich organism riding in on the shell of your snail, if you keep up your good water quality and keep your fish healthy, IT WON'T MATTER!!! Your fish will be fine! You'd be hard pressed to find anyone that has completely 100% eradicated ich from their tank. The reason people don't see it in their tanks is because their fish don't have outbreaks.

+1

If you've got great water quality, your fish should be able to kick the ich! I used to bring diseased fish home when we were about to put them out. None of my fish, including my copperband I had for months, ever got the ich, it just disappeared.

Ich is like the common cold, you're always going to have it in your system, but if your fish are healthy, they won't get it.

 

[yote]

+1 Nathan

 

[ndepratt]

+1 Nathan

+1 yote, let's keep the lovefest goin'!

 

[biodarwin]

+1 Everyone

At the local reef club meeting there was a gentleman stating the very same thing. Most likely your tank has ich. Most likely almost every tank has ich. It is just a fact of life. What you can do is keep up on the husbandry on your animals, regular maintenance(Clean filters, skimmers, water changes) and everything will be alright.

Another interesting tidbit he gave came in regards to diagnosing problems with fish. If you are only paying attention to the fish once they start to show problems the its too late. If you notice differences in their patterns then you can take action before the symptoms get to bad and will greatly increase the chances the fish will be ok. This is also where keeping a log book is handy. When you can add something to the tank either fishies, corals, or chemicals its good to know when and how much. If you start to see problems then you can check your log book. Maybe you missed a water change or your zoanthids started to disappear after adding a flame angel :) Obviously these are the apparent ones, but sometime they are less subtle.

 

[sen5241b]

Sorry to spoil the love fest. but many knowledgeable hobbyists have said the 'forever ich' theory is all wrong. It can be eradicated. Its easy to get it though. Yes, ich can hide in a tank by only infecting vulnerable tissue like gills where you can't see it and thus stay in the tank a long time after you think its gone. Also, ich can be introduced into a tank thru frozen foods. And yes, its easy to get ich into a tank from a new fish. But if you remove all fish, treat with copper and hypo for 6 weeks and then put fish back in --that tank will be ich free! Ich must have a host to survive.

I may have been too pessimistic about LFSs but I still have no doubt that there are too many that just don't QT fish before selling them to you.

 

[Bifferwine]

Maybe that's so, but is it really worth it? To me, I can't be bothered to quarantine every single fish and every single coral, shrimp, crab, snail, etc. for 6+ weeks! My fish have had on occasion, spots, but never what I would call a full blown ich outbreak. I've never had a fish with spots stop eating, let alone die of it. To me, it's much easier to keep the fish healthy and their immune systems strong in the first place than to take drawn out precautions that may or may not work to prevent any ich from entering the system at all.

 

[yote]

HMMM,,Lets see.I been keeping saltwater fish since early may of 06.As far as I know,I've never had a fish get ick.I've never messed with a quarantine tank.
They say that ick cant live without a host,I cant argue with that,bacause I'm not a biologist.But are we really sure we know all there is about the life cycle of ick?
I've seen fish that were treated for ick with copper and other medications come out a 8 to 10 week quarantines,go right into a brand new tank with just dry base rock and brand new water and that fish be covered in ick the very next day.
I can only go by what I've seen myself.And that tells me to just limit a fishies stress and keep my tank clean and the parameters stable and I wont have to worry about it.
Its worked for a little over 3 years.