If you are goign to be switching tanks right away (soon), I wouldn't bother putting your fish through the stress of a QT. I'd just set up my new tank, cycle it while watching my fish for ick, then I'd FW dip them before putting them into the new tank.

Feel free to do whatever you think is wise but I think its important to minimize needless stress while still maintaining diligence.

I added a Flame to my tank back in January and lost the Flame, a Regal Tang, Kole Tang, Blue Damsel and Coral Beauty all within 3 days to a disease that looked very much like Ich. The only fish that made it through were my two Perculas... both of which are still doing fine. I wish I had an explanation for it all..

I may be wrong about the ammonia and I admit there are variables on stocking levels, but are we not trying to give are creatures optimal conditions instead of "how many can I fit before there are problems". Even in you went 2 inches per gallon the numbers are still there. I'm sorry but I've been in this longer than most of you have been alive. My reference books date back to 1956.

I have a book here from Robert P.L. Straughan called the salt water aquarium in the home which states" The author has successfully kept in one fifty gallon aquarium the following: 2 4 inch cubbyu, 2 2inch parrot fish, 1 4 inch Spanish hogfish, 3 2 inch unicorn blennies, 1 3 inch cardinal fish, 1 1.5 inch orange demoiselle, 6 1.5 inch to 2.5 inch porkfish, 1 1.5 inch glass goby, 1 3 inch coral shrimp, 1 3 inch lima scallop, six 1.5 inch neon gobies, 1 2inch pistol shrimp, 8 1.5 inch beau gregories, 1 1inch hermit crab, 1 1 inch sharp nosed puffer, 1 1 inch convict goby, 10 1 to 3 inch black angel fish, 3 3inch four eyed butterfly-fish, 5 1.5 to 4 inch queen angelfish for a total of 55 fish. Although the aquarium was extremely crowed, there was no serious fighting and the fish were not breathing heavily. the aquarium could easily have withstood another dozen or more fish. A larger aquarium, three square feet by twelve inches contained nearly a hundred fish with no ill effects, and for certain small specimens such as the dwarf sea horses or neon gobies it is entirely feasible to keep as many as a thousand in a single 50 gal."

We all now know that this was probably bs right, but this was the info I had. I'm not trying to be " the #^&hole" here and I sure wish I had the info that is available now but I flinched when I read "maybe a small Yellow tang " and thought I had to say something. I'm sorry if I offend anyone but If we don't learn from others how many more will parish.

Don't apologise old guy...

Seems everyone is an 'expert'. With every bit of information given, it is up to the educated and informed reader to decipher which is appliable and valid.

I think the '1" of fish per 5 gals' rule is outdated just like the 'X watts per gallon' rule for light.

Inch is a linear 1 dimensional measurement and volume of water and size of fish are not 1 dimensional objects.

For example, let's assume a fish has a shape of a box. Let's say a fish of a certain species has a height of .5" and width of .5" and length of 1" inch. That fish would be .25 cubic inches.

Well, let's say another older fish of the same species is 2" long. Keeping the same proportions, its height would be 1", and its width would be 1". Then this fish would be 2 cubic inches. That means the fish is 8 times bigger.

So now, given that we have 2 fish of equal proportion, the rules states that the 2" long fish only needs twice the volume of water even though it is 8x bigger??? Expand that to a 3" or 4" of fish and you'll see how this rule lost me (IE. A 4" fish is 64 times bigger than a 1" fish but the rule says that the 4" fish only needs 4 times more water volume than the 1" fish).

Hi Scott,

Sorry to here about your Flame.:cry:

Eric

pin point that one pretty good I was never a fan of the measure stage for a salt water tank.

Yeah I am not on the inch/gallon rule, what if it is a 20G tank with 50 pounds of rock there is no swimming room or vice versa 20G with 2 pounds of rock. What about coral bioload? that also has to account for something.