Things have started to calm down a bit on my weekends so I've had more time to attend to fish.  One of the crappiest things about owning a saltwater fish tank is that you can't just add fish to your system immediately.  The fish come from the ocean covered in parasites, so you have to take extra special care of new additions to be sure they're clear of parasites and infections before you add them to your main "display" tank.  Quarantining fish is absolutely a necessary evil.  A lot of people neglect to do this, but it saves a ton of headaches.  Trust me on this, you would much rather lose an $80 fish than get your $3000 display tank infested with a parasite!

Anyway, the fall got clogged with trips and holidays.  Some of you may remember that back in October I tried to quarantine a yellow longnose butterfly fish and a powder blue tang that both died from a nasty bacterial infection.  Given that quarantining fish takes at most 2 months if they get sick, I didn't have enough time to cycle in more fish before Turkey Day!  Once Christmas passed, I was working on setting up an office tank for Whitney, so my quarantine system has been occupied with her inhabitants for the past two months...  Finally I was able to pick up a new butterfly fish a few weeks ago.  I treated him with formalin and malachite green to remove any external parasites.  He ate and pooped well, with no apparent parasitic infections.  I added him to the main tank yesterday and he seems to be getting along well with his new tank mates!