What went wrong?

[bio new]

Hello nice people here,

I m a new here. I have a 3 ft tank and using wet n dry filtration.

I have cycled my tank. Ammonia and nitrite read zero. Test kit is Sera.

Presently, I have 6 juvenile discus, looked like SS to me, bought from a LFS about 1 week ago. I feed them daily but not more than 3 times with homemade beefheart. The size of the beefheart is abt a normal dice.

At least 10% of WC is done daily before lights off.

Yesterday, I found one of them had clamp fins.

A quick test revealed that the ammonia shot northward tremendously.

I was panicked , and made at least 30% WC and put in abt two handful of table salt ( i smuggled it from my kitchen he he).

What went wrong? Cud it be because of the debris of uneaten beefheart which was left in the tank or the filtration could not take in amount of bio load of food that I gave to the discus?

Thank you.

[yogi]

It's probably from the beefheart. Beefheart spoils faster than any food you can feed your discus.

[April]

also..a 3 foot tank is smallish for 6 discus. how big are they? and if you can do at least 50 percent daily wc..it would help.
i would cut back on the beefheart and give a bit of bloodworms and flake the other feedings. just tiny amounts they come up to devour immediately. dont feed unless their up and begging and then they devour.
id up the wcs for now see if that helps. salt will help.
your filter may have been cycled..but maybe between the 6 new fish and the beefheart..it has to play catchup.

[Anonapersona]

After a little while, maybe half an hour or an hour, check to see if there is any food visible in the tank. If so, siphon it out and feed a little less next time.

[Barb Newell]

abt two handful of table salt ( i smuggled it from my kitchen he he).


Better to use non-iodized aquarium salt.

Barb :)

[April]

well..in a pinch i guess table salt will do..but pickling salt is good and quite cheap to buy. easy to find in a grocery store. or rock salt. etc. or..aquarium salt. good to have on hand.

[bio new]

Hi all,

Thanks for the speedy replies. :D

I'll certainly take down all the answers given and to do as advised.

CHEERS!