HOW MANY BABIES IN A 55 GAL??

[pete321]

How many small discus can I fit safely in a 55 Gal tank?
I am wanting to get a lot of young discus and grow them out and sell. I will be selling along the way, so I will end up with about 5-6 in the end.
I have 7 55's in a central system.
Total volume is about 1000 gal.
Thanks

Pete

[judy]

depends on what you mean by small. depends on your water change system. i.e. how often you do a large WC.

[Al M.]

I've had over 100 2" fish in A 55 before..... lots of water changes though....

[subcooler]

Just a thought:

Question: Do you know how to make a small fortune selling discus?




Answer:Start with a large one:balloon:

Rob

[Discus-Hans]

Just a thought:

Question: Do you know how to make a small fortune selling discus?

Answer:Start with a large one:balloon:

Rob

That one is as old as the beard of Mozes.
Brought up as first by David Webber if I remember well (does any one have his phone number by the way?? NOT from Mozes but from David :angel: )

Pete, I put 120-180 x 2.5" Discus in a 65 gallon, central system and water changes 10-20% every day.

Hans

[Lee C]

Yeah,$$
Won't get rich, but you can pay for the ones you keep and their food and electric bills....$$
30 to 40- 2" to 2.5 " in a 55gallon with minimum 30 percent water change per day. Filter with 2 hydrosponges on each of the 7 tanks.$$
If you can't do that, only get 20 per tank, about 140 small ones.$$, Don't stunt their growth or they are worthless big-eyed footballs.....Good Luck!

$$:D

[pete321]

I have 7 tanks that are 48" x 18" x 16"h
I also 10 tanks that are 24"x14"x14"h
All these tanks are linked to a central filtration unit.
I am wanting to import small discuss and grow them out to sell.
I will be selling them at different stages so that when they are adults I will only have a few left for my own breeding purposes.

So how many could I get to start off with?

Thanks

Pete

[Apistomaster]

Hi Pete,
If you have the customers to move the discus I would take a different approach.
Just buy them at the size you plan to sell. No way can you match the low overhead available to the SE Asian breeders.

Your tanks are an excellent size for this sort of buying then selling since they have good surface area:volume ratios.

Otherwise, keep a few different good selling varieties as breeding pairs and raise what you can sell of those.

From my perspective, as a small commercial fish breeder, you really do not have enough tanks to do much more than make enough money to pay their way, just barely. Profit is not likely to be part of this equation. You should do it because you like it. There is an unbelievable amount of better equipped competitors than you out there.

I don't make any money raising discus. Small breeders like myself have to find a niche in which there are few if any competitors. I raise fancy L-number plecos and their relatives for my "profits." Also a few Apistogramma and fancy shrimp. Discus help me by expanding the diversity of what else my customers can order. It really helps to offer more when trying to appeal to more buyers. I suspect you hope to sell your fish directly to fanciers at retail prices and this is already a all too well trodden path. If you can't sell fish to dealers at wholesale prices you'll find few buyers.

I just love discus, especially wild fish, and what I make is often just converted to acquiring more wilds and spp of fancy plecos.

I have been involved with most aspects of the commercial fish business and not only is it among the most risky of business ventures, the profit margins are really poor.
I hope my pep talk give you enough pause to do a reality check. One last piece of advice. Make a real business plan.

[pete321]

Hi Larry
Thanks for the reply.
There is almost no-one in my country breeding Discuss. Almost all discuss are imported from Asia.
Because of shipping costs and because most flights are not direct from Asia, the discuss that arrive here are mostly small and have not coloured up yet. Also because of the long flight, and trans-shipping, they usually arrive in poor condition. The pet stores then get these discuss in this poor condition and try to sell them at exorbitant prices. These fish are mostly dark and have not recovered from the shipping yet.
As you properly know, Most of the pet stores don't feed any quality food and these fish never really recover in their store. Most pet stores in the area work of a maximum dwell time in their tank for discuss of 2 weeks (less for other fish, usually less than a week).

I am hoping to sell to the pet stores. Maybe a few clients directly, but this would be the exception. I am looking at selling quality discuss that have grown to a nice size and have colored up nicely and are suited to local water. Our local tap water is ideal for discuss once the chlorine has been removed, no need for RO water.

So what I am wanting to do is buy small hormone free discuss that have not colored up yet, the raise them to a nice size, selling some off along the way , choose a few for breeding and sell the rest to pet stores and then start again.

Pete

[Apistomaster]

It sounds like my town. We have two pet shops; one Mom and Pop and a Petsmart.
Petsmart can't buy from individual breeders and the small business shop refuse to learn how or choose not to give young discus any more care than they do goldfish. They very rarely buy discus and when they do, the lose most or ruin them before they are sold. They won't buy my discus because they know that I know just how incompetent they are.

So this raises the question, to me, that maybe your potential customer shops are just as incompetent and will rarely buy discus unless they have a customer request some for some stupid reason. Who are you going to sell your fish to after they kill the first fish they buy from you?
They are going to blame you, not themselves, for their troubles. My nearest customer is 100 miles away. Only shop owners who like discus and know how to care for discus actually buy discus.

I am not trying to discourage you from keeping and breeding discus. I am only trying to address some of the practical aspects of selling discus. There is a very good reason why almost everyone buys discus from on line discus specialists. It is common knowledge that discus are as good as dead within the first 48 hours in the care of a typical pet/fish shop.

[pete321]

I live in a fairley large city.
We have about 10-15 fish outlets. About half stock discus.
Most discus survive at least 14 days in these shops. If the discus are good quality they are usuall bought very quickly.
We do not have any mail order fish in my country.
Most of the shops that stock discus sell about 5-10 a week.

Pete