Whats wrong here ?

[brewmaster15]

119544

125 gal tank...5 adult Discus.14 young homebred angels just starting to pair up.. The tank is my wifes and she does very good maintenance on it.... theres something wrong here though.Lets test your deductive reasoning. Whats wrong with this scene and why do you think its happened?

Clue.. all fish are very healthy and the tank is
very well maintained. The fish have been together for around 4 months...no additions .

Whats happening?
Al

[Second Hand Pat]

Hmmm... discus are all huddled in the corner and angels coming into breeding mode. Angels seem to be making very good use of the middle of the tank.
Pat

[warblad79]

Discus are outnumbered and angels are start pairing up. Also over crowding that's why discus are push to the other side.

[danotaylor]

The decor for the scape is being monopolized for breeding territories by the Angel's. Hence the discus displaced to the outside edge...

[Altum Nut]

Totally agree with comments above...time to move the Discus.
Another speculation is 2 or 3 of the potted plants are not doing so well.
I however have to ask Al...I blew up your photo and it appears or looks like the digital thermometer is missing the temp probe?

...Ralph

[brewmaster15]

You guys are pretty close. This is a classic example of a tank that has been doing awesome and suddenly the Discus are stressed . The culprit is the Angels. When they were small and growing things were fine. If it had been a couple of Angels no worries... 14 was too many. Once they got to adulthood and started breeding its a firestorm of hormonal passion. Angels can be very aggressive eaters is something we hear alot but they are also very aggressive when spawning. The discus have literally been pushed to the corner and the angels have been attacking them.You can see mouth marks on the sides of the discus if you were here. The change in the tank was literally over night..spanning a few days at most.

Bryan mention the tank was overstocked and that was a factor here as well as the angels pairing. By the numbers you would think so but its not a factor here in the aggression in itself .I have had far more fish than this in the tank with no issues.Tanks that are over stocked tend to have less territorial battles thats why 6 + discus in a tank are better than 3,imo.The number of angels that paired up at once was definitely a factor! So it was overstocked...with Angels!


Ralph, the plants are shot.. They were beatiful for a while but the darn angels are eating them. They are even picking at them to clean off as spawning sites.The temp monitor is just a cheapo ebay one..no probe.It was a few bucks and it really is a worthless piece of junk accurate to plus or minus 5 degrees.lol. I highly advise spending money on a cup of coffee instead of cheap digital thermometers.

The problem here is I bred the angels and wanted to grow them out and have a tank of angels...Then got hammered with Discus fry and had no place for the angels. So I moved them up to my wifes tank for a while and they did fine there a while. The tank looked great and my problem of where to move the angels was solved. But there was another trigger here. The tank usually had 3 more discus. A pair of very large pigeons were king of the tank.Just days before the war broke out I moved them to their own to breed them as they are my wifes favorites.The third discus was a very dominate one thats in a hospital tank for a bad heater burn..he got wedged I am assuming.
That changed the numbers from 8 discus to 5.

The basic problem here is Discus and angels can be fine together but they arent always compatible....these were for a long time. But things can easily go south even in a tank thats been perfect for months if you have a perfect storm of opportunity and change. I knew the angels would pair up and I would need to move the pairs with a plan to sell them. I didn't factor in the decreased discus numbers nor that the pairing would literally take place like a drunken college mixer for angels.

I have a bunch of issues now to resolve in that tank. These discus aren't sick all huddled in the corner.They are however very stressed. Its obviously not something to ignore.It will lead to them having a weakened immune system and getting sick if not corrected.

I still have way too many fish than tank space here. But I have options so today I will be making some changes.:)

My point in sharing this little tank drama is teach newer members how things can go wrong fast and to get them to really observe their tanks.

Hope this was interesting and some learned something here.

Al

[Boyd Luth]

Good day Al,
Just back to the Forum :-) Nice challenge with a picture. I had just PM Pardal who lives a bit North of me, and I wished to try Angels. I have never mixed even though I have read a bit on the Forum. One of the first suggestions he had was the Mathematics'/ratio of Angels to Discus. Thank you Al, Blessings to all.

[brewmaster15]

Good day Al,
Just back to the Forum :-) Nice challenge with a picture. I had just PM Pardal who lives a bit North of me, and I wished to try Angels. I have never mixed even though I have read a bit on the Forum. One of the first suggestions he had was the Mathematics'/ratio of Angels to Discus. Thank you Al, Blessings to all.

Hey Boyd! Welcome back!Great seeing you back online!

Al

[Adam S]

What's wrong? You have the tank on a fancy stand instead of another 125(?) below it on a rack.:p

Those angels look like bruisers for sure.

[brewmaster15]

What's wrong? You have the tank on a fancy stand instead of another 125(?) below it on a rack.:p

Those angels look like bruisers for sure.

Lol... well thats in my living room next to the dining room table. Believe me it was a huge victory when Carrie decided she want to keep and take care of that tank herself. You have to know when to hold em and know when to fold and walk away my friend. I left the casino with money on that one. :)

al

[Second Hand Pat]

Lol... well thats in my living room next to the dining room table. Believe me it was a huge victory when Carrie decided she want to keep and take care of that tank herself. You have to know when to hold em and know when to fold and walk away my friend. I left the casino with money on that one. :)

al

That's called picking your battles :D
Pat

[brewmaster15]

The Angels have settled in their new home. I will pull a few pairs out as they form shortly.

119679

Al

[Kwiege]

Those bullies!!

[brewmaster15]

Old thread but one I wanted to pull back to the top to illustrate what can happen when you mix discus and angels.
Im not saying it always happens or you cant mix angels and discus. Im sure there are many that do just that. End of the day its your tank to do with as you please..Theres a lot of factors to these kinds on things.... sometimes it just comes down to luck .. you luck out and get less aggressive fish or not...I dont know.. but I do know without a doubt that mixing discus and angels can be more of a headache then its worth...especially if they are actively and aggressively spawning.
Al