What to do with my two larger discus ?

[Discus3anatic]

I have 9 discus, 7 of which are in my 120g corner bowfront. I have two other larger discus like 7 inches in size that have paired off.. And due the extreme aggression in the tank i seperated them into a 27g hexagon by themselves. They have been fine together, eating like pigs still and laying eggs all the time but never really going past that. I recently renovated my larger tank and freed up a ton of swiming room by removing my large tree stump i had that took the majority of the back of the tank, It looked cool for a year but i got tired of it, also removed half of my red teletharis reneki plants in the tank basically all of them on the right side, and move my lotus to that corner and out of the middle. I add'd the driftwood you see in there, which used to be in my 55g tank laying on its side. Now its standing up and looks awsome in my opinion.

So anyway, the discus in this tank are smaller discus, most of which i doubt will grow much bigger. Most of them are like 4 1/2 mostly 5 inches, except my snow white which is about 6. They all have been together for a long time. That pair which werent a pair at the time, I got them like 5 months ago. They paired off a month later and i took them out because some of my discus stopped eating and got really skinny because of how litterally deadly the two became.. Its been a slow process but i managed to get the 4 who stopped eating to eat and gain some weight back.. So i decided to put them back in and see what would happen.. And of course both of them gang up on my snow white discus pecking him into submission to where he sits on top in the corner and cant come out for a second..

So i took the female discus out which is the smaller of the two like 6 inchs or so.. And the male calmed down and doesnt attack anymore and is his old mellow self before they paired off. However with him in the tank even though he doesnt attack.. those discus that stopped eating before in the past, did the same thing again and they hide and wont eat the last 2 days. So i decided to take the big guy out and put him back with his mate.. The minute i took him out the other discus came back out and started eating the beefheart i put in like 5 minutes prior and swim around the tank again..

This really sucks, because i like those two that i have and sure i can keep them, but i dont really want to keep them in a 27g hex the rest of their lives. I have larger tanks like a 44g and 55g.. but they have angel fish and jack dempsy and stuff and i dont want to risk that. What would you guys do ? Should I keep em ? Or sell them and maybe buy different discus and hope for a better temperment ? Whats odd is again if i seperate them the larger one is fine, he doesnt act any different then a normal discus.. Hes just massive and i wonder if thats another reason why they hide and stop eating when hes in the tank. And again the moment i took him out they all started eating again.

Here is a pic of the tank, they are all hiding because i flipped the lights on really quick to snap a pic

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[camthi609]

Or you can sell them to me......?.

[mee]

Personally I would initially give them a few more days to see if they will eat.. but secondly, I think I would go bare bottom, or at least remove allot of what you got going on in there. It is lovely, but if the fish have nowhere to hide, they may see it as futile, and start feeding more.

[Kyla]

i had the exact same issue with a huge male that became vicious when paired up. some discus will pair and terrorize a tank, others will be fairly peaceful when paired.

i have pairs in my tank right now that lay their eggs and gently nudge other discus away from their nest, but everyone gets along well.

like u, i tried several times to reintroduce this offending pair, and i also tried splitting up the pair. the female was fine when in the main tank on her own but the male wouldnt let others eat and battled my other males relentlessly even without a mate. this is a 180g btw.

i hated to do it, but i sold my aggressive male. he got along much better in my friend's tank. although a pair of my friend's discus that he targeted did have to be moved to accommodate him, he now fits in well there and the aggression is managed.

i miss him, but he is happier and the rest of my discus are happier.

i advise u to err on the side of caution, esp if your other discus are so negatively affected by the aggression. i lost my very favourite gentle male to aggression and to this day im still pissed off at myself for not removing the aggressor sooner.

[Discus3anatic]

Personally I would initially give them a few more days to see if they will eat.. but secondly, I think I would go bare bottom, or at least remove allot of what you got going on in there. It is lovely, but if the fish have nowhere to hide, they may see it as futile, and start feeding more.

The discus had plenty of places to hide with my previous driftwood in there. Hiding wasnt the problem. I thought i had a disease issue with 4 discus not eating, two of them died from starvation, until i finally realised they were afraid of the larger male. Even if i remove the female they are still afraid of him and i never get to see my blue diamond or my snow white as they hide from him. Sucks too because the big male is really pretty. Once i took the pair out the other discus started gaining weight again

Here are pics of them, the one with them in the group was taken like 5-6 months ago when i first got them. He paired with the Golden Crystal on the top right. As you can see they all used to swim together, but now he is out for blood.. Its funny, the female golden crystal doesnt really go after the others much, the male is the one that does. I wonder if i can put her in the tank with my others and if they would behave ok. Or should I just keep them together in the smaller tank ? Also that pic is what the tank used to look like as you can see it had plenty of hiding spaces under and behind that big stump (you cant see because of the lilly pad but that stump has a giant root system and even a 7-9 inch discus if i had one could fit under and swim through it. It deff isnt a hiding issue. And i do not like BB tanks, I would give up on fish keeping if i went BB i dont like those tanks at all.


Lets say i sell them, or sell the male. How much do you think i can get for a 7 inch Leopard i think hes a leopard ? Hes absolutetly beautiful and isnt stunted at all. I paid $75 for him 6 months ago.

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