Tranquility

[SGDiscus]

Hi everyone!

I have been lurking around this forum for awhile. I have been wanting to have wild discus for awhile but never had the courage until now. I had always been a planted tank guy but finally decided to take the plunge to do tank with plants and discus.

Some background to this tank. This is a 5ft tank with a 3 ft sump. It runs pressurised CO2 and with a 5hour photo period. The tank was started in Jun 2016 with various fishes (cories, yamano shrimps, golden tetras) added over a 6 to 7 month period. The wild discus (7 pieces) were finally added in on 17 Feb 2017. So these babies had been with me for just under 1 month. Thanks for viewing! I hope to continue learning from this forum!

[DatDiscusDude]

My god! Beautiful!!!

What type of wilds are those? Where are you located?

ANy fear in the rimless approach? How tall is that tank? Seems a little short, or the discus are big!

Either way, what a beauty I love it

[Discus-n00b]

Incredible looking tank, great fish too. This is extremely pleasing to my eyes, nice job!!!

What lighting are you running? I like the look and brightness to it.

[SGDiscus]

Thanks!

My LFS told me that they were Jatapu or Japura wild discus (Browns). We can't really be sure as he imported a relatively unknown Brazilian source. I lived in Singapore.

There is a real fear that the discus might do a jumper. To minimise that I had floating plants and also keep very low lights during the night until morning. The only scare I had was during the first time when I introduced freezed dried worms into the tank and placed the cube too high up. The 7 of them went into a feeding frenzy like pirhanas splashing water all over. The tank is 55 cm tall - i had it made that height so that it was easy for me to reach into the tank during maintenance.

The discus are between 4.5 and 5.5 inches.

[SGDiscus]

Incredible looking tank, great fish too. This is extremely pleasing to my eyes, nice job!!!

What lighting are you running? I like the look and brightness to it.


Thanks! I am running Aqua Illumination for the two lights. Admittedly, these lights are more suited for reef tanks.. but since I had them I just made used of them.

[DatDiscusDude]

Thank you for all the info! Really love the tank!

The wilds have a lot of red and striations on them, really pretty! They seem a lot more special than your run of the mill browns! Good LFS you have there they all look healthy and happy!

Yea I would be scared about the top too, but seems you have it under control... maybe a sunked glass top or a simple netting that could be hidden to prevent the fish to jump but not take away from the tank... It is hard with a tank like that it looks so pretty as is but the fear of a jumper would lead me to add something, I think...

Either way, please post more pictures!!!

[Coffee1stLife2nd]

nice tank and nice fish,,, Congrads,,,

[deliana]

Awesome!!!!!!! This is my dream tank. thanks for thew photo.

[Clawhammer]

Transparent netting is a good idea, although, if this were my tank there would be no risk of fish death by suicidal leap because I could never take my eyes off it. Beautifully setup! Great choice of fish :)

[SGDiscus]

Thank you for all the info! Really love the tank!

The wilds have a lot of red and striations on them, really pretty! They seem a lot more special than your run of the mill browns! Good LFS you have there they all look healthy and happy!


Thanks! To be honest... we think they are S.Haraldi. Depending on the amount of horizontal striations they have on their bodies... they are then labelled browns (with little striations, semi-royal with half the body covered or royal with the entire body covered.

Nevertheless... I just enjoy appreciating the discus as they are.

[SGDiscus]

Thank you all for your advice on the netting. I will look into it. Meanwhile.. let me try to share some photos.

[SGDiscus]

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Picture above - This was what the scape looked like in Jun 2016.

[SGDiscus]

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The picture above was how it looked like after I added more plants in Oct 2016.

[SGDiscus]

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This picture was taken in Jan 2017 with the 40 golden tetrA schooling. At this point, the scape is still the centre piece of the tank.... until....

[SGDiscus]

*deleted* double post.

[two utes]

You've done a fantastic job.....nothing beats discus in a nicely planted tank. Well done!

[JBurgo]

Incredible tank. Thanks for showing us! You're skilled with the plants and the fish are beautiful.

I don't know about the netting idea, the fish might get caught up in it.

[Discus-n00b]

Netting should be fine, it's fine enough that those fish won't get caught in it. Stretch it tight and use window frame or similar material to hold it and stuff will bounce right off of it. If you are extra handy you can buy more of the rim and do cut outs along the back for equipment like those light bars so the net top slides right on from the front and can sit fairly flat on the tank. Can also put a vertical piece on the sides just to lip over the tank so it doesn't slide and create gaps on top.

I use something like this for both of my rimless tanks, only really cover them when I leave the house and during the day at work. You can get thinner mesh too.
http://www.bulkreefsupply.com/diy-aquarium-screen-top-kits-for-rimmed-tanks-1-4-netting.html

[SGDiscus]

Thank you for your kind words and tip on the netting. That contraption looks really interesting.

I wouldn't say that I am skilled with plants or discus. I kinda just use the easiest plants that can adapt to low lights (lesser algae ) and relatively high temperatures that would suit the discus.

Some of the plants just did not work out in the tank. I did spend a fair bit of effort to adjust the co2, light and fertiliser regime balanced to get as little algae as possible.

As for discus keeping skills, this is only my 1st month ever. So I have a long way to go. But they got passed the first month fairly ok with no casualties to the existing fishes. I can't ask for a better start!

[Davidzil]

Very nice!!!

[plecocicho]

Nice tank, what are your water prameters, water change regime, filtration and what do you feed them?

[SGDiscus]

@Davidzil @plecocicho
Thanks!

At the moment, pH is about 7. I am waiting for the components to calibrate my pH pen. But last I checked, pH goes down to about 6.7/6.8 with CO2.

I don't measure TDS. My gh is around 9/10, kH is around 2/3 (based on Colombo test kits). Nitrites and Ammonia is 0. Nitrates is around 20 to 30ppm. Phosphate is less than 1 ppm.

I have been changing 50% water twice a week. I feed 1 or 2 pieces of frozen beefheart (formulated by a well-known discus LFS in my area) twice a day. Each piece is no more than 10 grams. (Around 1 square inch).

I have a 3ft sump with more than 40 litres of media. For added measure, I am also running a small internal filter inside the sump in case I need it for a QT.

[pastry]

That's just horrible. How about you just put the whole tank in my house and try again :antlers:

Really looks good SG :D. Hope to see more posts of it over time. Very jealous (obviously!)

[SGDiscus]

That's just horrible. How about you just put the whole tank in my house and try again :antlers:

Really looks good SG :D. Hope to see more posts of it over time. Very jealous (obviously!)

Haha.. Thanks! Here you go.... waiting for their food.

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[Filip]

This is one of the best planted display tanks I've seen on the forum lately SG. The name tranquillity suits it perfectly too.
Your discus are perfect shape and i love the uniform size of the whole batch too .

I would like you to give us a full info on your tank when youll have some spare time by filling up the tank questionaire found in the begginer section stickies .
Im curious if you have done a proper quarantine procedure prior introducing your discus or did you just put them directly in your display tank ?
How long did it took them to adjust and start eating and swimming ?

Im also curious about the CO2 injection you use . How do match your tap water PH with your lowered Co2 Ph during changes ? Do you turn off the co2 at night or use a ph controller ?
What type of water do you use for waterchanges RO , tap or aged ?

Sorry about all this questions SG but im very curious about your tank and keeping routines because it sure is a succesfull story so far .
After making all of us here planted tank lovers completly envyous of your tank and discus with your pics i think you owe us much more info about it :). And regular updates , offcourse :) .

[Jenene]

That is just stunning...even the composition of the fish swimming in the photo is perfectly balanced. Just wow!

Funny thing about the rimless and jumping. I am looking into getting a rimless reef tank and there was a beautiful one set up at a nearby reef shop. I asked the owner- How do you keep the fish from jumping out?" He was quite for a minute and then he said "I don't." I waited patiently for more of an answer as I looked at the expensive fish gliding around...and then he said with a wry smile "I just don't put fish in there that jump." He must have been asked that question more than a few times. ;)

[SGDiscus]

@Filip @Jenene

Thank you. I am humbled. This is because I have learnt alot about discus from this forum. I have never kept discus before and I have read alot about the pros and cons of keeping discus with plants. From the tips here and also speaking to various discus owners, I went about planning this tank almost one year ago after I have decided to decommissioned my two feet planted tank. I have had planted tanks for more than 10 years.

I will find time and try to put down as much information as possible about this tank and my observations (both the good and the bad). At this moment, the discus had only been in the tank for a month and while they are healthy I am still concern about my discus keeping skills. This is because I have not yet fully understood their behaviours. My family had already noted that our 7 seven discus each has unique personality and had already given them names. My mum calls them puppies...

Without further ado, here's one I took on Sunday.

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[SGDiscus]

Here's a view of
1. Big Black (alpha), centre top.
2. Black Eye (No 2), bottom right and
3. Strippy (No 7)

Ps:can someone please adviced me on how to rotate the image? The forum would not allow me to attached the rotated image from my phone.

[Filip]

Please do fill the questionnaire SG and give us more info on this beauty .
About the pics , I have try to reattach it rotated in your post from my phone and it worked for me . Unfortunately I wasnt able to delete your backward photo from your post .

Next time if it gives you trouble uploading any photo try to edit some feature on the photo , colour , balance , brightness etc. and upload the edited version instead .
That gets the job done , at least for me .

[JBurgo]

The phone has an auto-rotate feature, you need to turn it off so you can tell which way around the picture is before you upload it.
To delete the duplicate attachment you have to go into `Manage Attachments`.

[SGDiscus]

Please do fill the questionnaire SG and give us more info on this beauty .
About the pics , I have try to reattach it rotated in your post from my phone and it worked for me . Unfortunately I wasnt able to delete your backward photo from your post .

Next time if it gives you trouble uploading any photo try to edit some feature on the photo , colour , balance , brightness etc. and upload the edited version instead .
That gets the job done , at least for me .

Thanks! Funny thing is I am not able to edit my own post.

Anyway for the questionnaire, should I post it in this thread or in the Beginner Tank setup thread?

[Filip]

Thanks! Funny thing is I am not able to edit my own post.

Anyway for the questionnaire, should I post it in this thread or in the Beginner Tank setup thread?

I think that you got a time frame of 10-15 min. to correct or edit your postings SG .After that what's done is done.
So a wise thing to do is review your postings once again , right away after you post them and see if there is anything to correct in this 10 min. time frame.

You can post the Full tank specification where ever you think is more convinient for you SG .
You can proceed in this thread , or open a completely new thread in this or in "our tank journals" section.
Since there are already many comments and post here in this thread , maybe its better to proceed here , but feel free to decide that for your self .

[SGDiscus]

I think that you got a time frame of 10-15 min. to correct or edit your postings SG .After that what's done is done.
So a wise thing to do is review your postings once again , right away after you post them and see if there is anything to correct in this 10 min. time frame.

You can post the Full tank specification where ever you think is more convinient for you SG .
You can proceed in this thread , or open a completely new thread in this or in "our tank journals" section.
Since there are already many comments and post here in this thread , maybe its better to proceed here , but feel free to decide that for your self .

Thank you! I shall bear that in mind.

With regards to the questionnaire, I wanted to make sure that I did not contravene any accepted practices. I would like to take your suggestion to post in here as there have been a few questions about the tank.

[DatDiscusDude]

SG- Despite what Dilip says, please do not post anymore pictures....

I can't afford to keep replacing my keyboard as it gets fried from all my DROOL when I see your tank!!

DRRRRROOOOOOOOLLLLLLLL!!!!!

[SGDiscus]

This questionnaire may be used to either help you to describe your new tank setup for discus or
be a “food for thought” checklist while you consider what your goals are with your new discus tank setup.

1) Please Introduce your self and tell us what your experience is with fishkeeping, give us as much information as possible as to how long in the hobby, what you have kept in the past and what you currently are working with.

< Hi everyone, sorry for this slightly overdue introduction. But since I have gained much from this forum, it is about time I try to put back some knowledge so that we can encourage more people to have discus planted tanks. In order to do that, I thought it might be useful to share what I have done in fishkeeping/plant keeping hobby so that we can put into the correct context as to why I started this tank the way I did.

I had maintained a 2 feet hi-tech planted tank for about 10 years. In that tank, I have kept mostly cardinals, cories and shrimps. I also tried breeding bettas but stopped as it became too much work. In this 2 feet hi-tech planted tank, I have used ADA soil, Eheim Pro 2 and Pro 3 canisters, T5 lights with timer and pressurised CO2. Generally, I was able to maintain a balanced system with water change once a week at 50% with minimal greenspot algae.

Once I was comfortable with my plant keeping skills, I moved on to keeping slightly more exotic fishes that would go with planted tanks. Cories were one of my favourites... and they still are. Once I had a school of 30 hastatus cories and they were really a sight to behold.... but very fragile. I then moved on to various types of killie fishes. The priority then was to maintain an ecosystem that took no more than 30mins of my time in a week to maintain as I had young children and a busy work schedule.

Now that the kids had turned into monstrous teenagers and are almost out of my house... I have abit more 'me' time. At the same time, my house was due a renovation update and I talked my wife into having a nice 'planted show tank' in the dining room. That was how I ended up with a 150 cm (L) x 55 cm (H) x 60 cm (D). More about that later.

Believe it or not, the idea was mooted back in Dec 2015! I spent six months looking around doing research on a 150 cm (almost 5 feet) long planted tank. I definitely did not want to spend my whole weekend scrubbing algae off the tank. At that point, the dream was to have 100 cardinals and all sorts of cories/plecos in the tank. I always loved the tranquillity of watching a large school of cardinals and the playfulness of cories.

It was right around this time I started to come across pictures/images of discus in planted tanks. That was when the discus love-bug hit me. In my younger days, I have always stayed away from discus because of their reputation for having 100% daily WCs. But this time, given that I was able to dedicate abit more time (the plan was 1 hour a week), I decided to give discus a go. That's when I came upon SimplyDiscus.


2) If you have no previous experience with keeping discus, have you done any research to properly prepare yourself, e.g. have you read any Stickies in this section of SimplyDiscus, or other material?

< I think I might have read at least 70 to 80% of the stickies in this forum especially in the Planted/Show Tank, Discus Basics for Beginners, From the Source: Amazon and Disease/Sickness. I also spend some time visiting the various discus breeders in Singapore (where I lived).

The original plan was to go for Tiger Turquoise or Albino Leopard Snakeskins. However, I chanced upon a tank of wilds in one of the LFS... and as they say... the rest is history.

Besides reading, I also spoke to a couple of guys who had experienced with Wilds. Once I have decided to go Wilds, the next stage was to plan for the tank and the 'look' of the tank.

I also spent a few amount of time researching on hi-tech planted setup with a sump tank. This is because in the world of planted tanks... having a sump is not a commonly taken route as plant keepers are always concern about CO2 loss. For me, I had to balance between having a good filtration system and having healthy plants.

3) Describe your tank, its size and dimensions, breeding or display. Include how long it has been setup or if it is still being cycled.

So I customised made the tank to 150cm (L), 55 cm (H), 60 cm (D). The reason for 55 cm H was because I wanted to be able to reach into the tank for easy maintenance and scrubbing of the tank. The thickness of the glass (iron-free or crystal glass) is 15mm as I wanted it to be rimless (despite knowing that discus could be jumpers but more about that later) for the look and aquascape in mind.

The tank was setup in Jun 2016. The first fishes 10 x leopard cories, 10 x amano shrimps and 10 x otos went in around Jul 2016.

Filip had asked whether was the discus quarantined before being introduced into the main tank. Actually, I treated my main tank as the quarantine tank for all the fishes that I wanted to keep and the Wild Discus would be the last group of fishes to be introduced into the tank. The idea was to let all the other fishes settle down first before introducing the Wild Discus.

As for the Wild Discus, it was in my LFS tank for two whole weeks in which I was able to pop in unannounced after work to take a look at them. The seller is a professional. He was feeding the discus with beef heart and changing water on a daily basis while the discus was with them the entire two weeks. I continued to send him pictures of the discus once it was in my tank.

The discus was eating beefheart the next day after they were introduced into my tank. I fed them the same beefheart as the seller. Initially, I also feed frozen bloodworms and Australian freezed dried blackworms.

4) Describe the décor for the tank; type of substrate or bare bottom (BB), whether the tank will be planted or a biotope.

I decided against soil. This is after reading on the forums and talking to a few discus owners. In addition, I have had years of experience using ADA soil and I know the kind of muck that can kick up after a few years in the tank. I definitely did not want that in a discus tank. I also had a bit of re-scaping my tank once every few years to change the look. It can get quite messy.

In addition, I selected plants such as Amazon swords, anbuias nana plants, lotus and Java Ferns that would tolerate the high temperatures. Getting bucephalandras was abit of a mistake in a discus tank but that was the 'plant-keeper' in me that did the call. The buceps are getting by but not thriving as I had to reduced fertilizers and these plants really need lower temperatures to thrive.

Amazon swords are there to keep the sand aerated. Java ferns and anbuias nanas to provide the shape and feel of the scape. Key is getting a nice drift wood. The consideration of the scape was to (1) allow me to easily mopped down the side of the tank during water change, (2) breakline of sight as I was told discus can get aggressive towards each other and (3) provide some shade for the discus.

5) Describe your water changes planned or practiced, percentage and how often. Include if you age your water and use of tap/RO or mix.

Water change is twice a week at 50%. The pH right out from my municipal water is around 7. Gh is around 8/9 and Kh is around 2/3. So water hardness is around medium. I don't age my water.

During water change, I would use a tub as the holding point where I mixed Prime and piped the water direct from the tap via a python into the tub. From the tub, I would use a pump to pushed the water from the tub into the tank. It takes about 1 hour just to fill up 50% of my tank. So that's around 200 litres in 1 hour.


6) Describe the type of filtration planned/used for the tank; sponge, HOB and/or sump. Also include the other equipment you are, or will be, using in your tank, e.g. heater, lighting, etc.

The sump tank is 90 cm (L), 50cm (H) but water level at 30cm , 45cm (D). When power stopped, the sump is sufficient capacity to hold all the overflows. I do not have a heater at the moment. The water temperature in my tank ranges from 26 Degrees Celsius (78.8F) to 28 Degrees Celsius (82.4 F). As my tank is indoor with no direct sunlight, the temperature remains relatively constant except it gets abit colder during thunderstorms.

Otherwise humidity in Singapore is between 45% (night) to 90% (day). Average temperature in the day can go as high as 34 Degrees Celsius (93.2). One of the discus owners I know in Singapore keeps his discus outdoor in his backyard with some shades. He has no heaters in his tank.... rain or shine. If I get permission from him, I will post his set up here. He has some really huge (8 inch) Tiger Turquoises.

As for lighting, I am using two pieces of Aqua Illumination Prime. The light setting is at 70% from 3pm to 8pm. From 8pm to 10pm, it will run down from 70% to 1% Red LED. From 10pm to 7am, it will maintain at 1% Red LED. From 7am to 9am at 0% LED. From 9am to 3pm, it will move to 2% Cool Light LED so that the discus are not disoriented by movement outside the tank.

So far this setting had been good for plant growth, minimising algae and also minimising startling the discus during movement in and out of the dining area.


7) If the tank is already setup and running, include the water parameters;

- temp

78.8F to 82.4F

- tank ph

7.2 (with 200grams of oyster shells) and 6.8 with CO2.

- Ph of the water straight out of your tap

7.0

- ammonia reading - 0

- nitrite reading - 0

- nitrate reading between 20 and 40 ppm.


8) Describe your current or planned stocking levels; number/size of discus and number/type of dither fish. Where did you get your discus from or do you have a proposed source for getting your discus?

Stocking levels are as follows
a. 7 x Wild Discus
b. 5 x cory duplicareus (started with 8 in Aug/Sep 2016 but down to 5 since Dec 2016)
c. 2 x laser cories (started with 8 in Aug/Sep 2016 but down to 2 since Dec 2016)
d. 6 x lepoard cories (started with 10 in Aug/Sep 2016 but down 6 since Dec 2016)
e. 3 x MacMasteri Apistogrammas (1 male, 2 females since Nov 2016)
f. 1 x L333 (since Jan 2017)
g. 40 x Golden Tetras (since Jan 2017 amazingly... none have died or been eaten by the discus yet)
h. Unknown quantities of Amano shrimps (bought 20 x amano shrimps since the Jun 2016 until now)
i. Unknown quantities of Otos (bought at least 20 but some would have died.)
j. 3 x scarlet badis (saw only 1)
k. 1 x sparkling gouramis (started with 3 in Aug/Sep 2016 but 2 died before Dec 2016). These guys are my favourite in controlling snail population.

No more plans to get more fishes.

9) Describe your planned or existing feeding regimen. Include what and how often you are feeding on a daily basis.

Feeding frozen beefheart mixture twice a day. Each feed is about 1 square inch of beef no more than 0.25 inch thick. Once a week I will feed Australian FDBW. I have stopped feeding frozen bloodworms after the first week. No live food at all.

Although for the fun of it, I did feed papaya once. Surprisingly, a few of the discus actually ate it.

I have also tried adding orange peels into the sump to stimulate appetite. No conclusion for this method. But I do think that the discus can detect the scent of orange peels in the water.

10) What are your goals in this hobby? For example are you looking to keep discus in a planted community tank, or do you hope to become a hobby breeder of Discus? Do you want to raise Discus with the hopes of competing in shows?

The goal is to maintain a show tank in the dining room for family's enjoyment. So far everything is working out as planned.

[SGDiscus]

SG- Despite what Dilip says, please do not post anymore pictures....

I can't afford to keep replacing my keyboard as it gets fried from all my DROOL when I see your tank!!

DRRRRROOOOOOOOLLLLLLLL!!!!!

haha.. I think it's Filip...

[Filip]

Thanks for taking time to share your tank info . and your experience with us SG.
Interesting story . Now since you've already set up the teaser here , I would love too see more pics from that outdoor tank with 8" Tiger turqs as well as from your previous high tech planted setups you had :) .

Im all against testing the discus tolerance on daily 3-4 C temperature swings and temps below 26 C on a rainy weather but YMMV .
Personally I wouldnt allow temp. to drop more than 28 C.

PH controller for your Co2 unit will be also helpful on the long run to saltabilize your PH and avoid daily PH swings .

If your nitrates are 30 ppm without dosing No3 ferts in your tank but solely from disolved organics ,you might consider one more WC during the week .

[SGDiscus]

@Filip, thank for the tips!

I don't have a pH controller at the moment but the pH drop CO2 is no more than 0.5. A pH controller will be in my shopping list.

As for the water temperature, I was advised that heater is for the QT/HT for now. The temperature fluctuations in my region is not drastic and does not change suddenly as we lived just above the equator.

I went to check the Nitrate test kit. My apologies. My test kit measures in 0, 10 ppm, 20ppm, 50ppm and then 100ppm. It is possible during the measurement i thought it was darker than 20ppm but not yet close to 50ppm. The other gauge is the smell of the water and water clarity. If the water smells beefy or cloudy... I will do a water change.

Here are some of my photos of my previous tanks. Sorry I wasn't as good in taking photos in my earlier years of fish keeping and my plant keeping skills weren't that great.

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[SGDiscus]

@Filip

As for the Tiger Turqs... you have to wait awhile until he invites me to his house for dinner! But if I will definitely take some photos for you (if he permits).. afterall seeing is believing. :)

[SGDiscus]

Happy April's Fool!

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[SGDiscus]

If you are wondering how I got the discus swimming in one direction.... can you spot my secret?

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[Debow]

Do you have issues with your duckweed overflowing?

[DatDiscusDude]

Ain't no foolin' when it comes to that tank! Beauty!

[SGDiscus]

Do you have issues with your duckweed overflowing?


Hmmm not sure what do mean by overflowing. I assume you mean if the duckweeds grow fast and cover the entire surface of the tank. I clear the duckweeds once a week. So I don't really have issues with it. While it is very hard to measure how much nitrates it takes through the roots but I remember reading a study using them as part of a clean up strategies for water treatment.

[SGDiscus]

Ain't no foolin' when it comes to that tank! Beauty!

Thanks Dude! :D

[SGDiscus]

Happy Easter!

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[Jenene]

Looks like spring in there SG. Beautiful!

[SGDiscus]

Looks like spring in there SG. Beautiful!


Thank you! I have to be really discipline with the water changes.

[Filip]

Sorry I respond a little later to your update SG , but I see you bought 3 more wilds .
Given the time lapse of your posts I see you have skipped the QT procedure with your new 3 wilds .
Were they purchased from the same place / tanks , and how are they doing right now ?

Are they the same strain or something else ?

[SGDiscus]

Hi Filip, they are of the same strain but Royals. Not from the same source but second seller is also someone I deal with regularly. For me, the plan was to get these 3 and go through deworming process with the initial 7. This is since I had received the original 7 in Feb 2017 and the 3 royals in Apr 2017. I have just gone through a prazi and metro treatment with all 10 of them in my main tank. 2 of the royals had established themselves as No 2 and No 3 amongst the 10.

One of the new royals is not bulking up enough though he is the largest at 5" among the newcomers. He gets chased into a corner by No 1 to No 5 after a few nibbles. So I am going to take him out and QT him for a month until he bulk up. Hopefully he can hold his on after that.

[svboyn]

I know I am WAY late to this show but in doing research I want to replicate SGDiscus successful setup. Considering his tank is about 130 gallons and mine is 72 bowfront (so half of his). What would have to be my biggest adjustments (in terms of Co2, ferts etc, considering I will use the same lighting, plants, substrate.

Obviously I wont have as many fish (half of what he has). I have 1 Fluval Fx6 for filtration. my water pH/parameters is the same as his. any thoughts from anyone who has been following this thread? thank you!

[svboyn]

Also...I have a question about Ferts regimen. I noticed that it was missed in the the questionnaire. Could you please share this information about what, when and how you administer ferts?
thank you

[SGDiscus]

Also...I have a question about Ferts regimen. I noticed that it was missed in the the questionnaire. Could you please share this information about what, when and how you administer ferts?
thank you

Hi svboyn, I have not been very active on the forums but I am still active keeping discus. I have PM-ed you some of my experiences.

[peewee1]

Hi svboyn, I have not been very active on the forums but I am still active keeping discus. I have PM-ed you some of my experiences.

Did you discover breeding pairs, syboyn?

[SGDiscus]

Did you discover breeding pairs, syboyn?

you mean the discus in my tank? there was a pair but they never breed. The alpha just chased everyone around. probably my pH was too high between 7.0 and 7.4 (based on my pH pen).

I think syboyn was asking me about the fert regime for my tank.

[peewee1]

you mean the discus in my tank? there was a pair but they never breed. The alpha just chased everyone around. probably my pH was too high between 7.0 and 7.4 (based on my pH pen).

I think syboyn was asking me about the fert regime for my tank.

Sorry, I got the two of you confused. Where are you now with your discus?

[SGDiscus]

Sorry, I got the two of you confused. Where are you now with your discus?

In late 2018, I had to station overseas for work and I was constantly not at home. So maintaining such a big tank and the frequent water changes needed was not possible (I was doing once every 2 days). So I had to dismantle the tank. I am still keeping discus and I still have 1 of the original wild with me but i have kept it in a smaller tank. The current set up is just drift wood, thin layer of sand substrate and 4 hybrid heckels. I am just feeding pellets and flakes and water change with 60% a week. This is a much easier maintenance regime.

Bioload was too heavy for with 10 adult discus in a 5 ft tank even with a 3ft sump tank.

128355

[peewee1]

That is a nice looking Heckel. Female?

[SGDiscus]

That is a nice looking Heckel. Female?

Thanks! But I have no idea whether it is male or female. I am bad at sexing.

[LizStreithorst]

I would guess female. Quite a nice fish, too.

[peewee1]

I would guess female. Quite a nice fish, too.

Agree with, Liz.

[SGDiscus]

thank you!

[igotgats]

Hi everyone!

I have been lurking around this forum for awhile. I have been wanting to have wild discus for awhile but never had the courage until now. I had always been a planted tank guy but finally decided to take the plunge to do tank with plants and discus.

Some background to this tank. This is a 5ft tank with a 3 ft sump. It runs pressurised CO2 and with a 5hour photo period. The tank was started in Jun 2016 with various fishes (cories, yamano shrimps, golden tetras) added over a 6 to 7 month period. The wild discus (7 pieces) were finally added in on 17 Feb 2017. So these babies had been with me for just under 1 month. Thanks for viewing! I hope to continue learning from this forum!

Love the tank! Can you elaborate on your plants in sand? Is the sand on top of another substrate?

[SGDiscus]

Love the tank! Can you elaborate on your plants in sand? Is the sand on top of another substrate?

Hi, I only have sand as a single layer substrate around 2.5 to 3 inch deep. I would then put fertilizer balls (you can google them) beside the roots of the plants. Amazon swords do well. However, one will really need to be on top of your tank maintenance as planted tanks generate alot of organics.