The chronological order got messed up due to file size issues.
Key: 3-1-4-2-5
Nandi
Here are some pics of my wild Xingú Golden discus. In chronological order.
The chronological order got messed up due to file size issues.
Key: 3-1-4-2-5
Nandi
very very nice i need some of that .
Love those Xingu.
I think most of the Xingu have the best overall shape of any wild discus.
Your's are looking really really good. Good to see something different, thanks.
Bill
Wow nandi,
love the discus they love awesome,
the tank's similar to the one i have mine's a 3x2x2, i think your's is slightly bigger
share some more pix ! =)
Raymond
Super nice Wilds, they are gorgeous!
Eddie
Ah Xingú discus, the most underated wilds there are, nice ones too!
I agree with Bill too, consistently they seem to have great shapes for wilds, most pics I've seen of them point to an opaque eye color though.
When science and magic collide, the story begins.
Hi Nandi,
I have already commented on your beautiful Xingu's in the university so you know i love them. I also think one of the most underrated wilds as well, here in Australia we never get discus like that. I'd gladly own such a beautiful group.
I love your discus. They are very beautiful.
Chris
"The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated."~ Mahatma Gandhi
Thank you guys for the comments!
Yes, they are underrated and therefore extremely hard to get. I was looking for them for nearly 5 years before I found the one importer in Germany who had some.
The eye color is basically the same as the body color and to my best knowledge there are no Xingús with red eyes.
If I manage to get some F1's from them, I will gladly send a couple of boxes to Hans and let him deal with the distribution in the US. They would only be good for dogfood over here.
The one thing that bothers me right now is that the neighbours cut three lovely pine trees down in their garden, now there's no shade over the window and the surface of the white sand turned almost uniform green in about 4 days' time. Need a curtain, I'm afraid...
Will post some more pics, but I have to resize the already resized ones, as they are still a bit too large for Simply.
Nandi
I agree with the above posts, Xingu wilds are seriuosly underated among wild discus. They have perfect shape and just glow in their rich yelow/golden colour when they are aclimitized for half a year. Could you describe your tank setup more in details?
Here are a few pics for the better understanding of how my system was built.:
The tank is ~ 2'8" x 2'10" x 2' high (75x70x60cm) with two holes drilled at the back (I had the fittings at hand before I built the tank). The filter itself is a ~15gallon plastic drum with two intake pipes at the top and one pipe at the bottom, which delivers the water to the canister filter (~200gph), that drives the whole setup. Inside the barrel there are two spray bars for the even distribution of the incoming water over the filter surface. The filter materials from top to bottom are 1 part filter wool, 1 part sponge cubes and 3 part bioballs (from my old trickle tower). The canister filter is stuffed with Siporax with only a thin layer of filter wool on top to keep any solids away from the rings. The two holes on the tank are at the very top, basically skimming the water's surface, but not sucking any food leftovers or crap in. The filter is there to keep the water clean and I am here to keep the tank clean.
Some would say, that turning the entire volume of the tank over only 2x/hour is a little too slow, but it just seems to work absolutely fine for me. I put the filter together 3 or 4 weeks before the wild fish arrived and only took it apart once ever since, just to have a look at the bottom of the barrel and maybe clean the canister out. I put the whole lot back together again without cleaning anything, but the little filter wool in the canister filter. I can say, that the filtration system is hugely effective and almost completely maintenance-free. I'm not a grand master of water-testing, only checked for nitrites/nitrates/ammonia at the very early stages of the project, all I do now is stick the EC/pH-meters in the water and that's it. If there's something wrong with the water, the fish let me know in time.
The substrate in the tank is a 1/4" layer very fine white sand, no plants and there's one piece of wood with quite a few branches in it. The only eqiupment visible is the 300W Jager heater.
Did I leave anything out?
Nandi
Last edited by NanDiscus; 11-15-2009 at 11:52 AM. Reason: sp
As Eistein would put it" Interesting concept". Quite a nice solution for filtration. Is there a reason for a unorthodox aquarium measures? What is your water changing regime and where did you get your fantastic wood, it looks like a true tree branch? Oh and what are your water parameters?
And of course: MORE PICS!!!
The reason for the unorthodox tank measure is simply the lack of decent space. A tank twice this size is on order, I will use the exact same filtration system on that one as well.
The "fantastic piece of wood" is literally just a piece of wood I picked up on the side of a dirt track. It was dry, it looked cool, so I soaked it for a while, gave it a bit of scrubbing and some hot water and that was it. It is a branch of a trembling poplar/aspen tree.
The water change regime under normal circumstances is 30% every other day and about 60% on Saturdays. I mix 10 parts RO with 1 part tap->HMA, heat it up in a barrel, no airstone, nothing, just the heater. Let it sit for 24hrs and it's good to go.
The pH fluctuates a little due to the low TDS of the water, but with the normal w/c regime it stays pretty stable between the 6.6 and 6.9 marks (that's before and after w/c). The longest time they were left without a water change was 8 days, the parameters on the last day before the w/c were:
Hi everyone,
Here's a little update with not much else to report about other than the increasing level of agression in the tank and more signs of a few fish pairing off.
I must hurry my friend who is building the bigger tank for me, because it will be needed very soon.
I am planning to put little pieces of glass inside the tank, which will support the plastic sheets I'm going to use as partitions. I will be able to divide the big tank into three parts and if I happen to have two pairs, I will be able to provide the necessary space for all of them, while the water conditions will be the same in each partition. If things go well, I may even be able to raise two batches with their parents at the same time.
I am a little concerned about the currently 'other three' fish, because when they aren't being buggered by the most dominant ones, they give hell to each other as well.
I downloaded some pics from my camera the other day and selected a few random images.
After about two years I am still experimenting with my camera, because of the slightly insane light conditions. There is only one, 7W compact fluorescent lightbulb above the 2' tall tank and that source of light is rather weak for proper photography. Using the flash washes the colours out. Got a tripod, but hardly have the time to sit down behind it to capture delicate moments.
N./