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Thread: Hello from Illinois

  1. #1
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    Default Hello from Illinois

    Hi All,
    I'm returning to discus after a longtime away. I was big into discus in the '90s, having the opportunity to work with wild-caughts. However, I had to get out because of frequent relocations for my schooling and career. Moving so much, I could not provide the care that I knew discus needed and deserved. Between then and now, I filled the void with research and other fish. At one point, I had 14 aquariums in apartments / a small house, mostly South American and Central American cichlid breeding projects along with saltwater breeding projects. This was what my wife refers to as my "mad scientist phase" and frequent moves eventually made it too difficult to sustain that many tanks.

    My love of discus never left. That's a long time to keep an obsession pent up. I'm finally in a stable enough situation where I feel I can return to discus. To shake off some of the rust, I worked my way back in with my current 70-gal with Hero efasciatus and Guinanacara stergiosi . I've had these for 5 years and the severums are breeding.

    I remember a lot from my past experience with discus, but there have undoubtedly been changes, advancements, etc. specific to the discus hobby that I've missed over the years. I've joined this group to:
    1. get myself caught up on that knowledge
    2. gather input on the best breeding setup
    3. share my experiences with others from this point forward and help advance our hobby

    Again, I'm interested in gathering thoughts / ideas on the best breeding setup. I want to create the best setup, from the ground up / from day 1. I have always been (and continue to be) in love with wild-type discuss. I have nothing against the selectively-bred strains - they are absolutely gorgeous - but wild-types are just truly where my passion lies. Once I'm set up, I'll be looking to obtain wild-types to breed (or raise, pair off, and then breed). I'm particularly interested in including wild-type S. discus strains (i.e., blue face / royal blue Heckels). I'd prefer not to work with wild-caught Heckels again so I will be searching for F1s, F2s, etc. From my research with captive spawning of native temperate fishes, I have a few unorthodox tricks up my sleeve that may or may not apply to discus. For anyone interested, I'd be happy to give updates on how people's suggestions are working as my projects progress, as well as provide input on how well (or poorly) any experimental aspects are performing.

    Thanks for having me in this space.

    Chris

  2. #2
    Registered Member + MVP danotaylor's Avatar
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    Default Re: Hello from Illinois

    Great to have you in the forum Chris! Looking forward to tracking your re-entry into the beautiful world of discus.
    Check out Kenny's discus for wild type crosses, his ica red heckel cross is particularly spectacular, but also regularly gets blue faced browns, alenquer crosses and sapphire ruby in his shipments, and also freq brings in red cover & red rose.
    Chicago discus often have wild types & crosses as well.
    All the SD sponsors have been tried and true here over and over and are committed to quality discus and customer satisfaction.
    All the best mate!
    Last edited by danotaylor; 08-02-2020 at 12:31 AM.

  3. #3
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    Default Re: Hello from Illinois

    Quote Originally Posted by danotaylor View Post
    Great to have you in the forum Chris! Looking forward to tracking your re-entry into the beautiful world of discus.
    Check out Kenny's discus for wild type crosses, his ica red heckel cross is particularly spectacular, but also regularly gets blue faced browns, alenquer crosses and sapphire ruby in his shipments, and also freq brings in red cover & red rose.
    Chicago discus often have wild types & crosses as well.
    All the SD sponsors have been tried and true here over and over and are committed to quality discus and customer satisfaction.
    All the best mate!
    Danno, is a Blue Face Brown considered wild cross? The Ica Red is a nice fish but a rare order for Kenny. He gets very few of them. I did get the Ica Red last month and in less than a month it has spawned 3 times.

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    Default Re: Hello from Illinois

    Welcome, Chris. I too focus on the wild versions. I have had great success with the Alenquer but not so much with the Heckel. With regard to Kenny he does have a decent selection of wild cross fish each month but you would have to ask him with generation they might be. I would be surprised however if he said F1 or F2.

  5. #5
    Registered Member + MVP danotaylor's Avatar
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    Default Re: Hello from Illinois

    Quote Originally Posted by peewee1 View Post
    Danno, is a Blue Face Brown considered wild cross? The Ica Red is a nice fish but a rare order for Kenny. He gets very few of them. I did get the Ica Red last month and in less than a month it has spawned 3 times.
    I'm not sure if it's considered a wild cross Pee-wee, but is definitely a brown based wild type discus

  6. #6
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    Default Re: Hello from Illinois

    I like the Blue Faced Brown because it has some green shading in the belly area that caught my eye. Kenny told me that is was not a wild but to me it looks as much like a wild as any other wild fish.

  7. #7
    Registered Member + MVP danotaylor's Avatar
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    Default Re: Hello from Illinois

    Pretty fish that's for sure mate. I think Kenny would agree it's a wild type since browns are one of the original wild discus introdued into the hobby. Forrest is prob working with brown based fish so many generations away from wilds that they simply don't consider their stock fish as wild or any filial generation close.

  8. #8
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    Default Re: Hello from Illinois

    Quote Originally Posted by danotaylor View Post
    Pretty fish that's for sure mate. I think Kenny would agree it's a wild type since browns are one of the original wild discus introdued into the hobby. Forrest is prob working with brown based fish so many generations away from wilds that they simply don't consider their stock fish as wild or any filial generation close.
    Forrest told me that sometimes breeders will simply call a fish whatever it most resembles. He said, "...most ppl just name the fishes as what they look like in the end, some even don't use the strain name with "cross", they just use the name as it was." Best way to go is to buy either direct import wild or from someone like Al who might be offering F1 wild and then as you breed the F1 with a like F1 to keep the next generation true. For example Alenquer F1 to Alenquer F1.

  9. #9
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    Default Re: Hello from Illinois

    Quote Originally Posted by danotaylor View Post
    Great to have you in the forum Chris! Looking forward to tracking your re-entry into the beautiful world of discus.
    Check out Kenny's discus for wild type crosses, his ica red heckel cross is particularly spectacular, but also regularly gets blue faced browns, alenquer crosses and sapphire ruby in his shipments, and also freq brings in red cover & red rose.
    Chicago discus often have wild types & crosses as well.
    All the SD sponsors have been tried and true here over and over and are committed to quality discus and customer satisfaction.
    All the best mate!
    Thanks for the tip, Daniel!

  10. #10
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    Default Re: Hello from Illinois

    Quote Originally Posted by peewee1 View Post
    Welcome, Chris. I too focus on the wild versions. I have had great success with the Alenquer but not so much with the Heckel. With regard to Kenny he does have a decent selection of wild cross fish each month but you would have to ask him with generation they might be. I would be surprised however if he said F1 or F2.
    Thanks peewee1! I like Alenquer, too and on my list of possible targets. I figure I'll have my work cut out for me with Heckels. The last time I worked with them, I remember them being challenging.

  11. #11
    Silver Member Iminit's Avatar
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    Default Re: Hello from Illinois

    Hey folks went to local fish store today looking for some dither fish. Place was full of guppies and not much else. But they had what they say are wild caught discus. Some pics.CAED1B46-7501-4453-B578-DDD8649ED00E.jpg7D249260-3501-4169-A972-A93FD40A14C6.jpgB429CCF0-10C9-41D4-BD5E-47B67752500E.jpg75D2B7B1-9EFA-4342-882A-DF89C2B6671F.jpg. Was surprised to see these. What do you think? Wild? They were out of my price range and all 6+”.

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    Default Re: Hello from Illinois

    I am not aware of a Colombian Semi Red or does the sign mean "semi" wild? Could be F1 or more but the price seems in line for those fish. I had always been wary of any wild imports because their age is unknown. To buy a large fish could also be an old fish with a short life span ahead of it. My understanding is foreigners no longer bother looking for discus in Colombia. And that most are the green rather than the red. So what are these?

  13. #13
    Registered Member + MVP danotaylor's Avatar
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    Default Re: Hello from Illinois

    The Heckels look to be nhamunda blue face, but I could be wrong, as always, lol.
    One of the others looks distinctly like a tefe green, the others are a brown based of some sort, but who really knows...

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