Reef Chasers Quarantine Policy

Although we take every effort to quarantine, treat, and provide care for the livestock in our custody, the only way to truly guarantee the protection of your own system and livestock within is by implementing your own quarantine procedures. We recommend a minimum four week quarantine on all fish livestock, and a two week quarantine on all inverts.

"In an established reef system, a good quarantine procedure is paramount to long term success."

Quarantining livestock is one of the most important parts of proper aquarium husbandry. Unfortunately, many hobbyists often choose to overlook this to their own detriment. A quarantine tank should be used any time new livestock is being introduced into an established system. The potential risk for introducing unwanted parasites or disease-causing organisms is forever present in the aquarium hobby. In addition to protecting your system against these unwanted pests and/or infections, a quarantine system provides a great environment for your livestock to recover from the stresses induced by shipping. 

When not in use for quarantine, these tanks can also double as treatment tanks. Medicating or treating the entire aquarium display for a problem that affects only a few fish is not a good practice, and in a reef system with inverts it is essentially impossible to do so. A quarantine tank allows only the infected fish to be treated, leaving sensitive species like corals and other inverts in the main display unaffected by the use of chemicals or medications. 

We implement our own quarantine procedures at Reef Chasers, which helps give you an added benefit of shopping with the confidence that your livestock has been treated and handled with care through out the process.

Always remember that although we do our very best, there is no substitution for your own quarantine protocols. For those without the means for Quarantine we recommend shopping exclusively from the Salty Lagoon™, although there can't ever be disease-free guarantees, we CAN guarantee that fish in the Salty Lagoon™ are among the healthiest available for purchase online.
 

Reef Chasers Marine Fish Quarantine and the Salty Lagoon™

We have added a new section to our website called the Salty Lagoon! Only after fish have completed a full four week (28 day) stay in our state of the art Fish Quarantine system and passed a 5 point inspection for overall health are they moved to the Salty Lagoon Holding system. All specimens purchased from the Salty Lagoon are guaranteed to be among the healthiest available for purchase online. It's important to note that purchases of fish outside of the Salty Lagoon will have still undergone a minimum 10 day quarantine with health inspections and observation, as well as any necessary treatments. All fish offered for sale at Reef Chasers will have been in our direct care for a minimum of 10 Days.

All visibly sick fish will have been assessed, isolated to medical tanks, and provided treatment until they can recover. Visibly sick fish are never offered for sale at Reef Chasers!

Our quarantine system for marine fish is top of the line and second to none as we believe in competing with the best and doing so at the highest level. Our fish quarantine system runs at hypo-salinity (1.015sg/20ppt) with therapeutic levels of ionic copper sulfate (0.15 - 0.2ppm) which helps to alleviate stress on the fish as well as treat for a large swath of illnesses. We implement aggressive UV sterilization in order to further eliminate and prevent parasites. When we receive new fish, we drip acclimate them into our quarantine system over a 24 hour period under low lighting conditions in order to reduce their stress to a minimum. Our fish quarantine system is 1000 gallons and contains over 120 unique compartments, allowing us to individually contain and treat up to 120 unique specimens at one time. Each of our systems have independent filtration including large, functional refugiums, commercial RK2 foam fractionators (Protein Skimmers), and Aquadyne Fluidized Bead filters (on all marine systems).

Certain species of marine fish can be particularly prone to parasitic infections such as Clownfish, Damselfish, Tangs, Angelfish and Wrasse. Infections like Brook (Brooklynella hostilis) are attacked head on at Reef Chasers as we implement preventative measures on these specimens which include copper quarantine and medicated baths as needed with anti-parasitic treatments such as Formalin, Praziquantel, and Metronidazole. When we are dealing with Bacterial infections such as Vibrio, we isolate fish into 40 gallon medical tanks and provide treatments using medications such as Ciprofloxacin or other disease-specific anti-bacterial medications that are effective against pathogens  like vibrios, flexibacteria, and aeromonads. These treatments also help to control some common bacterial diseases in fish, including columnaris infections such as black patch necrosis, saddleback disease, and fin rot. 

Through-out their stay at Reef Chasers, we offer a variety of vitamin-enriched foods to all of the fish in our care. No fish goes starving at Reef Chasers! Nori on the clip is provided where appropriate as well as frozen foods that include mysis shrimp, brine shrimp, ghost shrimp, krill, R.O.E., copepods and various planktons. Foods are enriched with vitamins and medications in order to insure the fish in our care not only survive, but that they thrive!

We monitor and inspect livestock daily and provide treatments as necessary. After completing their four week stay in our Quarantine system, and only after passing a 5 point inspection for overall health will the specimen then be moved to our Salty Lagoon fish holding system. You can find the Salty Lagoon section on our website here where you can make your purchases with the confidence that the specimens you are buying are among the healthiest available for purchase online.

Coral Quarantine is equally important as there are many things we must watch out for when handling and introducing new corals into an established system. Especially colonies from the wild! All corals at Reef Chaser's are quarantined in a dedicated quarantine system for a minimum of 2 weeks of observation, and at times up to 4 weeks depending on the specimen and their conditions.

We are monitoring and inspecting daily for pests such as Aiptasia Anemones, Montipora Eating Nudibranchs, Sea Spiders (eeghads!), Euphyllia eating Flatworms, Fire worms and other unwanted intruders. Various treatment mechanisms are employed including biological measures Filefish, Wrasse, Berghia Nudibranchs, Peppermint Shrimp, and anti-bacterial baths, dips and treatments.

Although not looked at it in the same light as fish quarantine by many hobbyists, Coral Quarantine can be every bit as important to building a successful reef environment and in some cases can be even more detrimental if ignored.

When we receive coral livestock, the first step is to treat them all with a therapeutic insecticide bath for 10-20 minutes. While this is not 100% effective (it does not catch all the eggs) it does do a very good job at eliminating many living hitchhikers such as nuisance crabs, worms, nudibranchs, and sea spiders. It is NOT effective at eliminating Aiptasia. Certain coral species prone to bacterial disease in the wild such as Euphyllia are further dipped and bathed in a therapeutic solution containing anti-bacterial medication such as Ciprofloxacin. 

All corals are re-based and rinsed thoroughly before finally entering the Coral Quarantine system. These specimen's are then monitored and inspected daily for two to four weeks depending on the coral's condition and acclimation progress. If there are any signs of infection, disease or unwanted pests the quarantine system and affected corals are further treated as necessary. Once we become confident that a coral has what it takes to be added to the farm, we re-base it one final time and prepare the photographs that will be used to list the specimen on our website.

We hope these quarantine measures will give you added confidence in purchasing with Reef Chasers, we truly care about our livestock and ultimately your satisfaction. We hope that it shows in the health and longevity of our livestock.