Planted tank and water changes

[Rclarkie]

Thanks Flip that makes perfect sense! so it would be advantageous to maintain a ph of 6 - everything in the tank including the plants would prefer such - if possible.

[Filip]

Thanks Flip that makes perfect sense! so it would be advantageous to maintain a ph of 6 - everything in the tank including the plants would prefer such - if possible.

Well not really .Theoretically in order to get the desired non bacterial/ non pathogen very acidic environment for discus you'll need a pH much lower than 6.0 , I would say more about 4.0- 4.5 pH range.
And that kind of water is immposible for us to achieve in a small closed system , first because it would be a very hard to keep a water with pH that low cause it is very unstable - you risk PH crash (further sudden drop of pH ) and second with PH that low nitrosomonas and nitrobacter die off and you are back again with a problem of ammonia buildup .

So theoretically if we are able to keep pH 4. -4.5 with no ammonia buildup and pH crashes , maybe we would be able to keep discus without so many water changes , but unfortunately we are so far not able to do so, and that's why we are stuck with keeping the tank and water as sterile as it can be performing lots of WCs and lots of cleanings .

[TexMoHoosier]

Jack - I'm in the middle of re-scaping my 65 gal discus tank and a 29 gal soon-to-be shrimp tank, so I'll post some pics when I finish. The discus tank became a dumping zone for all of the plants that I didn't know if I wanted to keep.

[TexMoHoosier]

Thanks Flip that makes perfect sense! so it would be advantageous to maintain a ph of 6 - everything in the tank including the plants would prefer such - if possible.

That's playing with fire if you don't know what you're doing and there is really not much benefit to messing with your pH.

I don't totally agree that substrate houses an excess of pathogens that are waiting to attack healthy fish. Sure, there are pathogens there, but many also live in/on the discus itself, but if the fish's immune system is not compromised, they're held in check. I think the real reason people run into problems with substrate is that waste is not broken down quickly enough, excess dissolved organic compounds become toxic and other irritants affect the fish. When this happens, the fish's immune system has to kick into high gear ultimately weakening and allowing pathogenic organisms that are normally present to be a problem. This would happen regardless of an acidic or neutral pH.

[Rclarkie]

Thanks for all of the info it is certainly food for thought!

[bluelagoon]

Also,in the wild the water or pools in the dry season become very acidic where discus live.There may be lots of decay and ammonia present but the water is so acidic that the ammonia becomes non toxic.

[Jack L]

Jack - I'm in the middle of re-scaping my 65 gal discus tank and a 29 gal soon-to-be shrimp tank, so I'll post some pics when I finish. The discus tank became a dumping zone for all of the plants that I didn't know if I wanted to keep.

Thanks for mentioning EI, for some reason this time when i read about it(not the first time), it clicked, buying minerals, will give a try.

[Filip]

Thanks for mentioning EI, for some reason this time when i read about it(not the first time), it clicked, buying minerals, will give a try.

EI is an excess dosing method mainly recomended for a full blown high tech planted tanks . Meaning lots of light , lots of Co2 , rich nutrient soil , tons of plants , weakly trimmed bags full of plants etc , etc.
Its not something that you want in a low tech planted discus tank .
Try PPS-Pro if you like to start mineralizing, its moderate dosing system recomended for slow growing systems like low tech tanks.

[bluelagoon]

You can also use the EI method in a low tech discus tank.I have and with no CO2 or rich soil.The water gets changed just as any other discus tank.The chemicals are cheap if you buy them in the right place.I trimmed weekly and even some red plants did well.

[LoGeek]

I'm not experienced with discus, but I am with all sorts of planted tanks. You can definately do EI in a low tech tank. You can use the method in any tank with plants as long as the water changes are performed.