How To Accimilate

[Sara]

OK, decided that we will use the 55, their future home anyway, as the accimilating tank as well. Since there is nothing in it right now except guppies and catfish and a pleco.

When we get the 7 juvie dicus we imagine they will be in bags from the shop guy.

What do we do once we get them home to accimilate them to the our water and temp. and all the other stuff. And how long in between adding our water to the store water, we need help on this one.

[afick1975]

Sara I don't accimilate my fish at all. I have the temp. at 92 degrees and I check with the place or person where I get them from to see what ph they keep them at. Make sure the ph is about the same and cut open the bag and use a net to remove the fish from the bag and put them into the tank. I have 50 plus various size discus and i have never had any problems doing this and with in two hours the fish are eating.


Andre

[Carol_Roberts]

I think 92 is too hot. I would have the tank temp at 86/88

IF the pH at the store is the same or a little less than yours I would simply open the bag, pour out most of water, reach in bag, gently grasp discus, plop in tank. Repeat until all bags empty ;)

[Sara]

Darn, I know better to ask questions stating all facts and forgot this one.

The guy where I am getting the discus from is great but remember him mentioning he has salt in all his tanks as precaution, I need to ask him if he keeps his discus in salt water as well, I know he keeps his angels in it.

So if they are in salt added to the aquariums is the adding them right to the tank ok? Or stress them badly?

[Dragonfly_DS]

Wow Ander, 50 Discus. Thats a lot of fish. How many tanks do you have?? You must feed them a ton. Do you use live foods at all or just frozen stuff? I'm looking at getting my first tankfull of fish any day now. So you just put them straight into the tank and theres no problem. Thats good to hear. How many gallons per fish do you allow for?

[Carol_Roberts]

Discus are not brackish fish. Salt is ususally used for a few days to treat minor problems. It's not a good idea to keep them in salt all the time.

[Sara]

Yes I know they are not salt water fish same as angels are not, What I meant was if he does have them in salt water how do I accimilate them to my fresh, clean water?

The clean to clean water part is great if he has them in clean water, The salt water is the one that worries me about plopping them into my clean water.

[ronrca]

If in doubt, use the following method:

One of the most importants things you can do for your fish when you first receive them is properly acclimate them. There are various methods around however I have found 1 particular method that works very well.

Supplies need:
- A container: 5G pail or similar! Size does not really matter except if you get lots of discus in one order you may need more or larger containers
- Airline hose
- Airline valve

When first receiving your discus, most , if not all are shipped in plastic bags containing X number of discus! Gently place the discus and water into the container from the bag. Connect the airline hose to the valve. Place one end of the airline hose in the tank that the discus are going to be calling home (other end will be connected to the valve). The other hose place into the container (Basicly, its a siphon setup). By siphoning the tank water into the container, you will slowly acclimate the discus to your tank parameters. The valves will enable you to adjust the flow rate. In the beginning, set the flow rate to only a drip until you roughly doubled the volume in the container. Then you can slowly increase the flow rate. Depending on the difference of water parameters, it will determine the lenght of acclimation. I would recommend nothing under 2 hours just to be cautious. I never use the plunk method even if water parameters are close. You may also want to add a heater once the container is half full. Once the container is full or you have added 5-10x the volume of water, net and place in your tank. If the container is full and you still need to add more water, just remove the water from the container via siphon or little container.

So far, this method has proven bullet proof and I prefer it over the float/add water/dump method.

[dred]

Sara,

Every move is going to be stressful for the Discus. If you can pic them up when he receives them, you can match the breeder's water. You save the fish a whole round of acclimatizing that way. Plus you avoid any possibility of exposure to something bad at the LFS. LFS's rarely observe a proper QT procedure, so I still suggest you try to just get the directly from the breeder.

And, I agree with Carol. The least stressful way for your fish to arrive home is to match the water they are kept in so that shock is minimized. Water changes will pull the water back to normal quickly enough.

I use the bucket method when absolutely necessary (if matching their water is impossible). But, fish can get injured in buckets, and by nets, so ... If you are calm, the fish will relax into your hand, but they always thrash and flip in nets.

You can help with temp adjustment by floating the bags for awhile if the fish seem to be doing ok in the bags.

milton

[afick1975]

Drangonfly I have about 100 tanks and ten of them are discus tanks. Sometimes I change 50% twice a day and sometimes only once a day. I can't wait for the end of the month because I have a few more discus coming. I also plan to buy some at the ACA this year.


Andre