Are Heckels really that hard to spawn?

[brewmaster15]

Hi all,
Just curious about something...and yes I do think they are hard to breed...very hard by most accounts..

Actually what I am curious about is the degree that mortality plays in the difficulty of breeding these fish..

Over the years I have seen many heckels sold and bought by hobbyists.....Few of these last in captivity though... I rarely see people with them for years... I wonder the extent this affects the potential of heckel X heckel breeding?

So let me ask all the heckel keepers out there and former ones... How long have you kept a heckel in captivity? and how many have you kept for x amount of years..

-al

[Apistomaster]

Hi Al,
Over the years my Heckels lived as long as the other wild discus have.
Most of the problems people will have with Heckel survival is during the first month or so. They are usually very run down of still bearing bite damage that happened in the wild or by predator fish in the net but given a reasonable amount of care they healed well.

The acclimation period is when every effort should be made to provide them with their native water conditions otherwise many will die.
I use water prepared to no more than pH of 6.0, 10-20 ppm TDS and peat filtered. I do elevate the water temp 88dF only reducing it to 82-84dF as they build back their weight and appetites.
Once the have recovered they are a hardy and resilient fish.
As we have discussed Heckels do best when kept with their own kind. They are not as assertive as the other wild discus(all things being equal)and so do not compete well with blues or Greens the same size.
They have never had to.
The longest I kept Heckels which were very large adults when I received them was 5 years. Then they were sold. That means the Heckels were at least 7-8 years old and still in prime condition.
It was in this group of Heckels that I had one pair? that continually guarded and cleaned a flower pot. That was 1968 to 1975. The beginning of my breeding discus.
We sold our fish shop and I continued breeding discus for wholesale sales.

Larry W

[Chinaman]

Hi Al,

I had two batches of heckel in the past 18 months. The first batch were a group of 10 3" heckel lasted about 3 to 4 months. They were feeding really well on flakes, out of the blue they just start spinning around and start loose one every other day. It will then stop and it will start again after couple of weeks until they are all gone.

The last batch i got 6 4.5-5" heckel, 2 3" heckel and a 5.5" RSG was about 10 months ago. Similar things happened, the one that was doing really well just dropped with no sign at all. Then I lost 2 more spinning around.

Took one of them out to paired off with a female leopard had wrigglers but they ate them.

The 4 remaining heckels were feeding well, until i moved them to a smaller tank in a centralised system. The two small one start spinning around......

I keep my heckel in my breeding centralise system with their own tank. Use RO and tap mix to bring the conductivity to about 70us.

I have try to think or research on what can cause them spin around, but haven't got much joy yet......

cheers

Jim

[brewmaster15]

Hi Jim,
Thats really odd that you had this happen. Occasionally over the years I have seen an odd discus or two spin out like that and die, I have read of others having it happen....but for so many to happen... something is wrong there... If that happens again ...It may be well worth it to send the fish to a pathology lab for a complete workup. Most labs only charge a small fee for this....but the knowledge gained can be priceless.

Thanks for the post!

-al

[OnyongJun]

I've had the Current and only batch of Heckels I'm keeping for over a year now. Bought them when they were around 3inches in diameter and have had no problems keeping them in local tap water conditioned to eliminate chlorine before use in fish tanks.

The only other Discus I've kept are the Brown ones. Never had a problem with them either. I know the importer debugs their wild caught fish before they are sold.

[Ed13]

Chinaman, like Al said its something rare to loose two bacthes in the same way with out prior signs. If it happens again you should take some fish to a lab and dissinfect with bleach the tank and equipment befor using it again.

[Apistomaster]

The symptoms are very reminescent of "whirling disease", a viral disease.
It has spread throughout most of the trout streams of the USA and a vaccine is being worked on. It has primarily been reported among families of coldwater fishes including carp as well as Salmonids. It is extremely contagious.

If a warmwater form exists it would have serious consequences to the ornamental fish trade and of course aquarists. However I think that your fish were infected with something more prosaic. I think deworming wild discus is among the most important things we can do with newly imported discus.
Any organism that penetrates the brain could cause similar symptoms.
A pathogical analysis is definitely is warranted as is disinfecting tank and equipment before risking more discus.

Larry W.

[yogi]

Heckels in the right conditions should live as long as any other wild discus. If you buy adults you should get at least 5 years out of them. Male heckels are not hard to breed, it's the females that cause the problems. It's sounds like human life. I will dig through my old photos and show you three different male heckels breeding. I've never owned more than a few heckels at at a time, so it is possible that I never owned a female heckel. When the male heckels bred the ph was in the low 5's or high 4's peat bomb filtered water with a conductivity around 200 and temp around 84.

[Ed13]

Heckels in the right conditions should live as long as any other wild discus. If you buy adults you should get at least 5 years out of them. Male heckels are not hard to breed, it's the females that cause the problems. It's sounds like human life. I will dig through my old photos and show you three different male heckels breeding. I've never owned more than a few heckels at at a time, so it is possible that I never owned a female heckel. When the male heckels bred the ph was in the low 5's or high 4's peat bomb filtered water with a conductivity around 200 and temp around 84.

It kinda makes you wonder if there really is a possibility that you haven't owned a female or as Larry said there was damaged to the ovaries by the higher calcium in the water

BTW, all this talk lately about heckels and the fact that they might be the cheapest wilds ( at least from the ones I like) has me itching for a new 120g just for heckels;)

[Apistomaster]

It is ironic that Heckels prices have come down so much recently.
The glory days of large imports of Royal Blues and Greens in the mid 60's to early 70's the prices of Heckels were close to the same as the other discus.
Only the common browns were really cheap.
Of course that was then. I paid a little as $15.00 for large Blues back then when I had a fish store. Price noted was my wholesale cost. Large Heckels were the same and "Blue" Heckels were more like $20.00. Once they came in they were really the same fish with a different trade name.
Fred Cochu, Paramount aquarium, would often have discus that were different from the majority of the West Coast wholesalers I usually bought from.
Heiko Bleher was often his fishing buddy so that explains a lot.
Larry W.