Makko's first Discus tank

[Iminit]

Nice look tank and discus. Enjoy!! Yes stick the fdbw cubes to the glass. If loose add them and water to a cup for a min than spill in.

[Shan_Evolved]

Very cool. How old/big are your guys? They look great in color compared to my little ones

[Makko]

I go 4 inch ones from Hans. They are very nice I am super happy. I just hope I can keep them healthy.
I went with a little bit bigger as I had the budget. That does increase the stress a bit to keep them happy.

The checker board ones are more white than I thought, I am hoping they get more red as they grow.
That is just being picky as they are still beautiful.

I plan to do weekly videos, that is a great idea. Thanks Stan

[Makko]

My week 1 video. I noticed the fish seem to be breathing fairly fast. Do they look normal ?
I run a sump with good flow but no airstone. My water is at 84 so im concerned.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jvnJnJrnr3E

[two utes]

Nice looking group and set up you have there Mark. It looks like there's a fast flow of water in your discus tank, and if you direct it towards the surface of the tank and agitate the surface it may solve your problem

[Makko]

Its been a while since I posted here. Here is a very very late update.

I had this tank with discus a little over a year and a half. I took it down 2 summers ago when my wife and I went on a 4 month road trip across the US. ( my job went full remote ) The video is a little before we left. I sold them in about 30 mins lol. I used that video on Craigs List and set the price what I paid so a little low. I still had 8 of the 9 I got originally. The guy that got them seemed into Discus, that was my main concern. I quizzed him down about his setup.

The one fish I lost was a water change that I got distracted by a work call and didn't recheck the water temp in my barrel. I swung the temp about 10-15 degrees. Total bonehead move. Four fish got sick 2 came back fine one died and one almost died / got stunted a little.

An interesting story was the big freeze in Texas in February of that year. We lost power several days the first 2 being really bad. I didnt have a backup generator ( another bad move). I did have a good battery air pump and plenty of batteries. When it started I didn't realize how bad it was going to get. Luckily when our water heater died a few years back I did not get a tankless water heater like most my neighbors. So we had hot water. I started by doing small water changes to keep the temp up and get the tank super clean. After a few hours we learned this was going to be a long ordeal. Inside my house was about 40 by that time. Again by luck I had 3 one gallon jugs in the trash. I wrapped by tank in many blankets ( not popular in a 40 degrees house ) I found that using the 3 one gallon jugs with straight hot water I could hold the temp in low 80s if I changed them every 40 mins.

I used my phone for a timer and every 40 I would change the jugs. It was hard. I got lucky again that night ( 20 hours in) as the power kicked on. The sump was super cold 40ish by then and the return pump started spinning up. I happen to be right there heard it and dove for the plug. bullet dodged ... We got 1 hour of power which was huge. Heated the house up into the 60s. Charged everything and got some news. After that we had 8ish hours of power off and about an hour on for the next couple days. By the second night I was wiped out. Luckily my son and wife took the early evening and I got some sleep. By day three power cycled on more and more and I could heat/kick on the sump some and feed a little. So all in all those are some lucky Discus.

After the summer road trip on the return leg we found a house in Colorado we really liked. Im there now and setting up a new tank in the basement. I plan to start a new thread as I get it done.