Gaman-Dekinai
04-18-2018, 02:56 AM
So I've been keeping fish a while now, but after a quite sudden and surprising move my beautiful full grown red tail shark and Betta cardinals and, mollies all died when I regretfully had to have my roommates move my fish while I was at work. So I've decided to start from scratch and get the fish I've always dreamed of. Discus.
My 55g tank ran fishless for about a month and a half when it cycled. I have a Finnex 24/7 led light, 80g hydro sponge filter, and a SunSun 304b 100g cannister filter. I have a thin thin layer of sand with 2 small potted anubias, 1 2inX5in Java fern mat, a fake log with Java moss attached, and 3 medium to small rocks forming a Cairn all on the left side of the tank away from where I feed and the intake. My tank parameters are at 6.4-6.8pH, 0 ammonia, 0 Nitirite, and 5-10 Nitrate.
Today marked the first day my first real batch of discus arrived, but I'll start from the beginning. After the tank ran fishless for a month and a half I added 8 cardinals and 4 sterbai Corydoras from my LFS. They were all fine and had no spikes of any sort when I noticed the largest Cory cat one morning before work was laying on its side at the bottom of the tank when it was fine and happy eating bloodworms running around the night before. Ran late for work so couldn't do anything about it when later in the day my gf called saying it was dead. But 2 weeks went by and saw no signs of sickness so I added the rest of the cardinals to make a total of 13 cardinal Tetras. 3 weeks to the day goes by and with once a week 50% WC and no drastic spikes in anything I decide to go to the LFS to start stocking on discus food when my gf noticed they actually just got a shipment of discus from Singapore the week prior. After looking at how some looked from the incredibly pour hygiene in the tank k and no basic knowledge of discus (tank said it was at 75 degrees in a 20 gallon tank with probably 25 discus) my gf convinced me to spend the extra money for a small discus to save the best looking one. Ended up buying a stunted roughly 2.75in checkerboard blue with a clipped eye. He had the most color, was the most active and reacted great when I asked if they could feed a small amount. It's now been 12 days with 50% WC 5-6 times a week that's he's been by himself showing Zero signs of sickness (stiill treated for worms and bacterial/parisitic infection s)and is finally the day hes getting some friends. 3 specifically from Uncle Sam's Discus.
The packaged left Ontario Airport (LA not Canada xP) at 12am and arrived to my door at 10:40am in Sacramento. Opened the box and noticed it was soaked and saw the heat pad was wet too. Got the fish out to see if they were alive and they were but tested the temp of the water and it measured at 60 degrees :O can only help but wonder if these guys would've survived if they were shipped somewhere farther :/ but I start the acclimating process by letting there bag float in my tank for a bit to help warm them up. Did that for about 30 minutes when I opened their bags in a bucket and started slowly over the course of an hour added some of my aquarium water to the bucket. Finally I eagerly added them into the tank. My goodness was it as beautiful as I imagined guys. I've never owned another fish like it that's for sure.
I now am the owner of a 2.75in Blue checkerboard named Zen (the LFS fish), a 3in Blue Diamond named Mizu (Japanese for water), 4in Red Melon named Kasai (Japanese for fire), and Enso the 5in Ring Leopard with 13 Cardinal tetra and 3 Sterbai Corydora Catfish.
Since adding them everything seems to be going ok. I've had the lihhts dimmed as low as I can. Zen the fish whose been here the longest really took to the new fish well and vice versa. He swam to them and hasn't left there side since. The biggest one Enso adjusted surprisingly fast and well only hanginf out at the bottom on his side for maybe a minute before he started swimming around exploring. The 2 smaller one Mizo and Kasai layed on their sides for hours only swimming around for a bit only to find a new place to plop down and rest which continued for about 5 hours. But it's now been a total of 14 hours since forst introduced to the tank and they are now allbschooled together for the night occasionally going around skimming the ground together looking for lefrovers (I'm glad they seem hungry) but that's all I really have for today here's some pictures of all my fish :D
Kasai the red melon114942
Anndddddd it's not letting me post the rest of the pictures so I'll update that does you guys later once I figure this out lol.
My 55g tank ran fishless for about a month and a half when it cycled. I have a Finnex 24/7 led light, 80g hydro sponge filter, and a SunSun 304b 100g cannister filter. I have a thin thin layer of sand with 2 small potted anubias, 1 2inX5in Java fern mat, a fake log with Java moss attached, and 3 medium to small rocks forming a Cairn all on the left side of the tank away from where I feed and the intake. My tank parameters are at 6.4-6.8pH, 0 ammonia, 0 Nitirite, and 5-10 Nitrate.
Today marked the first day my first real batch of discus arrived, but I'll start from the beginning. After the tank ran fishless for a month and a half I added 8 cardinals and 4 sterbai Corydoras from my LFS. They were all fine and had no spikes of any sort when I noticed the largest Cory cat one morning before work was laying on its side at the bottom of the tank when it was fine and happy eating bloodworms running around the night before. Ran late for work so couldn't do anything about it when later in the day my gf called saying it was dead. But 2 weeks went by and saw no signs of sickness so I added the rest of the cardinals to make a total of 13 cardinal Tetras. 3 weeks to the day goes by and with once a week 50% WC and no drastic spikes in anything I decide to go to the LFS to start stocking on discus food when my gf noticed they actually just got a shipment of discus from Singapore the week prior. After looking at how some looked from the incredibly pour hygiene in the tank k and no basic knowledge of discus (tank said it was at 75 degrees in a 20 gallon tank with probably 25 discus) my gf convinced me to spend the extra money for a small discus to save the best looking one. Ended up buying a stunted roughly 2.75in checkerboard blue with a clipped eye. He had the most color, was the most active and reacted great when I asked if they could feed a small amount. It's now been 12 days with 50% WC 5-6 times a week that's he's been by himself showing Zero signs of sickness (stiill treated for worms and bacterial/parisitic infection s)and is finally the day hes getting some friends. 3 specifically from Uncle Sam's Discus.
The packaged left Ontario Airport (LA not Canada xP) at 12am and arrived to my door at 10:40am in Sacramento. Opened the box and noticed it was soaked and saw the heat pad was wet too. Got the fish out to see if they were alive and they were but tested the temp of the water and it measured at 60 degrees :O can only help but wonder if these guys would've survived if they were shipped somewhere farther :/ but I start the acclimating process by letting there bag float in my tank for a bit to help warm them up. Did that for about 30 minutes when I opened their bags in a bucket and started slowly over the course of an hour added some of my aquarium water to the bucket. Finally I eagerly added them into the tank. My goodness was it as beautiful as I imagined guys. I've never owned another fish like it that's for sure.
I now am the owner of a 2.75in Blue checkerboard named Zen (the LFS fish), a 3in Blue Diamond named Mizu (Japanese for water), 4in Red Melon named Kasai (Japanese for fire), and Enso the 5in Ring Leopard with 13 Cardinal tetra and 3 Sterbai Corydora Catfish.
Since adding them everything seems to be going ok. I've had the lihhts dimmed as low as I can. Zen the fish whose been here the longest really took to the new fish well and vice versa. He swam to them and hasn't left there side since. The biggest one Enso adjusted surprisingly fast and well only hanginf out at the bottom on his side for maybe a minute before he started swimming around exploring. The 2 smaller one Mizo and Kasai layed on their sides for hours only swimming around for a bit only to find a new place to plop down and rest which continued for about 5 hours. But it's now been a total of 14 hours since forst introduced to the tank and they are now allbschooled together for the night occasionally going around skimming the ground together looking for lefrovers (I'm glad they seem hungry) but that's all I really have for today here's some pictures of all my fish :D
Kasai the red melon114942
Anndddddd it's not letting me post the rest of the pictures so I'll update that does you guys later once I figure this out lol.