I don't know how to answer that: What should you do?
Plenty of folks on here experience a blood-pressure spike just hearing you talk about doing that; they are likely the same folks who boil rocks and sterilize gravel and encase driftwood in clear epoxy blocks before placing it in their tanks. It's hard to argue with any of that, because the possibility of pathogens and parasites is ever-present and the more you do to combat them, the better...maybe...
On the other hand, there are people who go to a bait shop in the morning, buy a couple dozen minnows from the seething, cloudy leper colony in which they are kept, drag them around all afternoon in the hot sun, and then if any are left alive by day's end they just happily throw them into their aquariums with their prized specimens. It's hard not to call that suicidally dumb...but sometimes it works out fine...maybe...
I won't say where in that spectrum I fall, because no matter what I say it's bound to amaze/offend/amuse people at the opposite extremes. I don't worry about cross-tank contamination when dealing with my established tanks; if transferring plants from outside to inside, I take a quick look to make sure I haven't accidentally scooped up an otter or snapping turtle, and then plop 'em in. Same thing when it comes to fish; I temperature match the water and then in they go.
I don't dump the source water in, just net the fish and drop it in.
But...when buying new fish, or back in the day when I could collect wild specimens, they would always be subjected to at least a couple months of strict quarantine...strict as in keeping the tank in another room, with no shared tools, buckets, nets, etc. I think that fish get sick mostly from coming into contact with sick fish.
If I see a leech or snail or aquatic insect larva in my tank, I might remove it...depending upon what exactly it is...or I might just leave it be and enjoy it. I recently lost a long-term pet: Snot the leech. He appeared in a tank a couple years back as maybe a half-inch baby; the last time I saw him alive, undulating gracefully through the water, he was about 5 inches long. He was, like most leech species, a scavenger who never bothered his tankmates; I was truly saddened to find his mangled corpse jammed into a hole in the screen over the tank drain. I'd get another in a heartbeat, and someday will...probably out of my own backyard pond...
But...there are MFK members who would resort to tactical nukes if they ever saw a 5-inch leech in their fish tank.
So you have to decide what makes you comfortable...what is just plain lazy...what is overly paranoid...and then go with your gut. Every answer is right...and wrong...to at least some extent. Good luck!
Edited to add: Do you own a dog? Do you ever let your dog kiss you on the nose?
If you do...then you are probably exposing your own internals to a greater and more varied selection of bacteria and other creepy-crawlies than any simple handful of duckweed will introduce to your tank.
If you don't, and find the notion disgusting...then buy yourself a UV sterilizer, a few gallons of peroxide, and forget all about outdoor aquatic plants indoors.
Plenty of folks on here experience a blood-pressure spike just hearing you talk about doing that; they are likely the same folks who boil rocks and sterilize gravel and encase driftwood in clear epoxy blocks before placing it in their tanks. It's hard to argue with any of that, because the possibility of pathogens and parasites is ever-present and the more you do to combat them, the better...maybe...
On the other hand, there are people who go to a bait shop in the morning, buy a couple dozen minnows from the seething, cloudy leper colony in which they are kept, drag them around all afternoon in the hot sun, and then if any are left alive by day's end they just happily throw them into their aquariums with their prized specimens. It's hard not to call that suicidally dumb...but sometimes it works out fine...maybe...
I won't say where in that spectrum I fall, because no matter what I say it's bound to amaze/offend/amuse people at the opposite extremes. I don't worry about cross-tank contamination when dealing with my established tanks; if transferring plants from outside to inside, I take a quick look to make sure I haven't accidentally scooped up an otter or snapping turtle, and then plop 'em in. Same thing when it comes to fish; I temperature match the water and then in they go.
I don't dump the source water in, just net the fish and drop it in.But...when buying new fish, or back in the day when I could collect wild specimens, they would always be subjected to at least a couple months of strict quarantine...strict as in keeping the tank in another room, with no shared tools, buckets, nets, etc. I think that fish get sick mostly from coming into contact with sick fish.
If I see a leech or snail or aquatic insect larva in my tank, I might remove it...depending upon what exactly it is...or I might just leave it be and enjoy it. I recently lost a long-term pet: Snot the leech. He appeared in a tank a couple years back as maybe a half-inch baby; the last time I saw him alive, undulating gracefully through the water, he was about 5 inches long. He was, like most leech species, a scavenger who never bothered his tankmates; I was truly saddened to find his mangled corpse jammed into a hole in the screen over the tank drain. I'd get another in a heartbeat, and someday will...probably out of my own backyard pond...
But...there are MFK members who would resort to tactical nukes if they ever saw a 5-inch leech in their fish tank.
So you have to decide what makes you comfortable...what is just plain lazy...what is overly paranoid...and then go with your gut. Every answer is right...and wrong...to at least some extent. Good luck!
Edited to add: Do you own a dog? Do you ever let your dog kiss you on the nose?
If you do...then you are probably exposing your own internals to a greater and more varied selection of bacteria and other creepy-crawlies than any simple handful of duckweed will introduce to your tank.
If you don't, and find the notion disgusting...then buy yourself a UV sterilizer, a few gallons of peroxide, and forget all about outdoor aquatic plants indoors.
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