No substrate needed. If you have space, keep a sponge filter or small HOB running on one of your tanks all the time that can be moved to the sick tank. Use fresh water, not tank water. If you don't have a spare filter, use media out of an existing filter. An ammonia spike could kill an already stressed fish.

 

What I do is keep an extra sponge filter in the full-time tank for use when setting up a temporary hospital/quarantine tank. If it's going to be a permanent situation I guess you could always keep some guppies or something to keep the nitrifying bacteria alive. But then you'd have to do something with them when you were using it as a Q-tank.

I would leave it bare bottomed to make it easier to keep clean.

If you don't have time to get a sponge filter seeded you could suspend some substrate from your established tank in a mesh bag in front of the filter outlet on the new tank to help jump start the cycle. But you'll have to monitor ammonia and nitrites and do water changes to keep them low enough not to be harmful to your quarantined fish.

 

Great help, as always from this forum!

In case of quarantining new fish:

What I would do is just get my 10 gallon tank that I will be using as a QT tank, no substrate, maybe just some black or blue background paper to put on the bottom glass so that the reflection will not confuse the fish and one or two hiding spots. Then, I will do a DIY sponge filter that I will place in the sump of my established tank (I only have space next to the submersible return pump) and I will move the sponge filter to the QT tank whenever I bring new fish home and leave it there with the fish for about two weeks + some substrate from main tank in a mesh bag, checking for ammonia daily, but the sponge filter should help the nitrogen cycle I guess. The tank will be filled with fresh water (using Prime to neutralize chloramine, etc.) instead of water from my main tank, even if it's healthy. After that I will sterilize the sponge filter and substrate bag (even if new fish was healthy) and return it to the established tank's sump and drain the QT tank until future use.

In case of illness:

I will fill the QT tank with fresh water, use Prime as dechlorinator, move the sponge filter from the sump to the QT tank and treat the fish accordingly. Follow the same procedure stated above and, when done, either sterilize the sponge filter or throw it away and make another one (DIY), to be sure. If treatment affects the "good bacteria" I will continue checking for ammonia daily and do water changes as needed. When all done, the tank will be drained until future use.

Does this makes sense?

Thanks.

 

Sounds like a good plan to me. I would imagine that if it was just one (or two) small fish the sponge from your sump would have adequate bacteria to handle the light bio-load it would get with no problem.

 

Cool. Thanks. Last two questions, how long should it take for the sponge filter to seed after I place it in the sump? and, what's the best way to sterilize the sponge filter and substrate mesh bag to reintroduce it to the established tank?

 

I'm guessing two weeks minimum but I don't really know how long it'll take to be honest.

As for sterilizing, either bleach water, boiling for a couple minutes or maybe even a few seconds in a microwave ought to kill about anything that might be on them. Even just letting them dry out completely for a couple days would work.

Honestly I'm just guessing though. Most people would probably go with bleach water but I kind of like the microwave idea. I know it works for when my kitchen sponge starts to stink.

 

Sounds good. Can't wait to get plants and new fish, it's not as exciting as it was at the beginning so it's time to add something new.

Thanks for your help! and thank you allierw, too.

 

I've done the microwave sterilization with good results. Just make sure that your sponge is damp when you microwave it. Letting it dry out is a good way, too.

For a 10g tank, running the sponge for 2 weeks is probably enough. 4 weeks is probably ideal.

 

It doesn't matter in what part of the sump the sponge is placed? or it needs to be in a specific place, like, for example, under the bio balls or something?

 

I go a bit different when I have used my small tank for QT. It is often something that I don't exactly know what ailment the fish really has. Once cured and the fish moved back, I leave the filter on and running and bleach the entire tank, filter and all. I then drain and let it all dry totally before starting over. I find little trouble with ammonia spikes in Qt due to the limited feeding I do with sick fish. I also do lots of water changing when I have fish in a small tank. I would rather fight a possible ammonia spike than fight exposing a sick fish to a disease that might be left over from the last fish. Ammonia, I can deal with easily, disease is a real challenge just to get the correct treatment picked out. I hang a bag of ammo -carb in when needed.

 

I go a bit different when I have used my small tank for QT. It is often something that I don't exactly know what ailment the fish really has. Once cured and the fish moved back, I leave the filter on and running and bleach the entire tank, filter and all. I then drain and let it all dry totally before starting over. I find little trouble with ammonia spikes in Qt due to the limited feeding I do with sick fish. I also do lots of water changing when I have fish in a small tank. I would rather fight a possible ammonia spike than fight exposing a sick fish to a disease that might be left over from the last fish. Ammonia, I can deal with easily, disease is a real challenge just to get the correct treatment picked out. I hang a bag of ammo -carb in when needed.

Totally agree. If I have to do daily 50% water changes on a 10 gallon tank because of ammonia spikes I can deal with that, but seeding the tank with bacteria from the main aquarium should help.

thanks everyone!