Is it worth having a hospital tank

[Country joe]

I have a small tank that I use for a hospital tank, when it's needed, when fish go in water is tested and is always okay, I have most illnesses covered, with products, I have had four fish in it at various times, and two did have the difficult swim bladder, but after using meds, and not over dosing, I have lost the four of them, so now apart from easy treatable ich etc, I reckon it not worth setting up to save one fish, that is going to die no matter what you do.

 

[GaryE]

It's a bleak perspective.

I don't have a hospital tank. What I always have instead is quarantine tanks - large, cycled and as good as a regular tank. Since I've quarantined all new arrivals for 4-6 weeks, I haven't needed to 'hospitalize' any fish.

I do weekly water changes, and don't either overstock or overfeed. I choose tankmates after reading up on them. That's left me not needing to isolate any fish except very old ones, in over 15 years.

Just in case, I always have one more filter running than I need. I have extra tanks (just the glass boxes) in storage. They show up in garage sales, flea markets, thrift stores, Facebook fish clubs, etc. In a crisis, I could kick one into gear. But with careful preventative maintenance, I haven't needed one for a long time.

 

[gwand]

If a fish is sick I assume the tank is contaminated. So I treat in situ.

 

[Back in the fold]

A guy should have an extra aquarium around that he can fill on a moments notice for rare emergencies . A ten gallon can sit in the closet until you need it .

 

[Innesfan]

I do, I guess. It has multiple purposes, hospital being one.

As @Back in the fold stated, you don't necessarily need to have one set up but you can press a spare into service. I keep extra sponge filters going in various tanks so I can use one or more of them for a newly set up emergency tank.

 

[TwoTankAmin]

I normally do not cycle an H tank. I an changing water a lot instead. I either replace meds removed to do a water change or I do the change so it coincides with the time to re-medicate, In that case I change water and add the needed dose for that day.

There are exceptions to the above. I had to treat a big clown loach for wasting. I happened to have been running the bio-farm to set up summer tanks. So, I moved the cucled filter into one ot the 20L tanks I was putting into use and diverted it for use as an H tank. I needed to treat the fish with flubendazole and, if the treament succeeded I also needed to bulk the fish back up. All worked out fine as this was in the start of summer 2023. The fish is still doing well today.

I never give up on trying to treat and save any sick fish. Sonce that clown was the only one in the tank suffering this issues, I felt safe in not having to treat the 150 gallon tank in whicn ot was living. It takes a lot less meds to treat a 20L than a 150. However, when I know something iis likely to infect other fish, I will treat the whole tank. Sometime I will remove water from the tank to reduce the quantity of medication I will need to be adding.

The reason I usually do not have an H tank cycled is that if I fail to save the fish I need to sterilizzed everything in the H tank with a strong bleach treatment. This includes the filter and media involved as well as anything in the tank and the tank itself.

Basically, I do what the situation calls for each time. I will go the great lengths and spare no expense to save a sick fish. But when I know this is not possible I will euthanize before I let a fish suffer anuy lomger than I must. I also have a med kit which contains an assortment of treatments. This means when some meds have not been used for a decent amount of time I made discard and replace them. I can afford to do this.

I also keep some plastic plants and rocks and caves on hande for use in an H. Tank. I do not use wood as it is much more difficult to disinfect using bleach and with a stonger solution it can degrade the wood. I want to be able to reuse the entire hospital set-up the next time it is needed. On the other hand when I need a Q tank, I prefer to use live plants and a cycled filter.

This is how I do things and it works for me. Others have do do what woks for them and what they believe is the right thing to do.

 

[Back in the fold]

I keep extra sponge filters going in various tanks so I can use one or more of them for a newly set up emergency tank.

Very easy to do and sometimes provides a backup to other calamities .

I normally do not cycle an H tank. I a changing water a lot instead. I either replace meds removed to do a water change or I do the change so it coincides with the time to re-medicate, In that case I change water and add the needed dose for that day.

This is what I do . If I’m treating with potions or salt then that’s going to kill the filter microbes .
Also : NO substrate just a bare aquarium .

 

[emeraldking]

I do have a quarantine tank. And if needed I can use some more tanks as a quarantine tank. New fish will always be kept in quarantine for a couple of days before leaving to their final tank. But also sick fish can be put in there if needed.
In my case, it's needed to have a quarantine tank (or call it even a hospital tank). For I'm always cautious with my fish because most of them are rare. So, it's not that I can get myself some new ones that easily. A store won't have them.

 

[TwoTankAmin]

Salt does not kill filter bacteria. However, in sw there are similar bacteria to what we have in freshwater. However. In saltwater their are few species of nitrifiers than are found in fresh.

Roeland Grommen, Lenny Dauw, Willy Verstraete, Elevated salinity selects for a less diverse ammonia-oxidizing population in aquarium biofilters, FEMS Microbiology Ecology, Volume 52, Issue 1, March 2005, Pages 1–11, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.femsec.2004.10.001

Abstract​

The activity and changes in the structure of the community of the ammonia-oxidizing bacteria belonging to the Betaproteobacteria were monitored in freshwater and artificial seawater biofilters for two months after inoculation with a commercial nitrifying consortium. Both in freshwater and artificial seawater, ammonium oxidation proceeded immediately after addition of the inoculum, although initial activity in artificial seawater was lower than in freshwater. Denaturing gradient gel electrophoresis of the ammonia-oxidizing bacterial community of the inoculum and the freshwater and the artificial seawater aquaria as a function of time showed that initially only one dominant ammonia-oxidizer, closely related to Nitrosomonas marina, was detectable in all the systems. The fingerprint of the ammonia-oxidizing bacterial community in the artificial seawater biofilters continued to be dominated by this single band. In the freshwater aquaria, in contrast, the composition of the ammonia-oxidizer community became more diverse after one month, with 4–7 new bands appearing in the denaturing gradient gel fingerprint. Since the inoculum is cultivated at an average salinity of 11 g 1−1, it is argued that the elevated salinity selects for a less diverse ammonia-oxidizer community in the inoculum and the artificial seawater aquaria.

The above is why Dr. Timothy Hovanec, aka Dr Tim, offers three different formulations of his bottled bacteria:

- One & Only Nitrifying Bacteria for Freshwater Aquaria
- One & Only Live Nitrifying Bacteria for Saltwater Aquaria
- One & Only Live Nitrifying Bacteria for Reef, Nano and Seahorse Aquaria

I have a brackish water tank which should I use?
If your water salinity is less than 10 ppt (1.007 specific gravity), use the freshwater version. If the water salinity is over 10 ppt, use the saltwater version of our products.

 

[gwand]

I have a quarantine tank but I converted my hospital tank for other purposes. If I have a sick fish I treat the whole tank. How does one know the illness has not spread throughout the entire tank and the other fish will soon be ill?

 

[fishorama]

I had a 10g in my basement I could set up with cycled filters from healthy tanks in ~15 minutes. It was much more a quarantine tank for impulse buys than a hospital tank for sick fish. I did use it as a hospital tank once or twice when an ill fish needed isolation. Rather than an entire tank of fish needing meds or after that didn't work for all & I didn't want to stress other fish for the sake of 1 still ill. Also less expensive to treat a small tank &/or work do frequent water changes.