How long do you need to quarantine a fish for to leave behind red slime algae?

[Labora]

If a fish is in a tank with red slime algae, what is the best way to transfer a fish to avoid bringing the bacteria at a 100% success rate? In other words, I can't afford to bring red slime algae to my main tank.

Would it be something similar to a coral dip or would you let the fish sit for a couple days in a QT with a couple fresh transfers? If you were to "dip" would you use chemiclean or something else? I have some chemi on hand. Need some time and method recommendations.

The fish are hardy (basslet, damsel).

 

[Jay Hemdal]

IMO - if the Cyanobacteria are in the same room/house as the tank you are trying to keep it out of, it's going to get in there eventually...through physical transfer on some item, or even aerosolization. Probably best to plan for that eventuality and try to develop a DT that isn't a good environment for it to grow.

Jay

 

[Brew12]

If a fish is in a tank with red slime algae, what is the best way to transfer a fish to avoid bringing the bacteria at a 100% success rate? In other words, I can't afford to bring red slime algae to my main tank.

Would it be something similar to a coral dip or would you let the fish sit for a couple days in a QT with a couple fresh transfers? If you were to "dip" would you use chemiclean or something else? I have some chemi on hand. Need some time and method recommendations.

The fish are hardy (basslet, damsel).

Cyanobacteria can travel miles through the air in a viable form. If you live within a few miles of any body of water (even small fresh water ponds) then you will likely get some in your tank. This is very similar to nitrifying bacteria.
If you set up a sterile QT system in your house and add dry processed flake food, it will still eventually cycle and can still get cyano bacteria blooms.

 

[Labora]

Well this is terrifying but very good and valuable information. I'm going to go ahead and shut down this cyano tank today with that news and just hope that my main didn't catch it but I don't see any red bloom in it yet.

The red slime algae came from a coral purchase and it devastated the little 10g I put it in last month.

 

[Labora]

Okay I just stripped the tank and dumped all the water out so I'm now down to my main tank.

The smell was so bad I almost threw up. Is this really cyano? It's more like a dark red.

Should I put some chemiclean (on hand) in my main tank for preventative maintenance? It has an rbta in it but I haven't seen any adverse effects against it.