Help designing new tank

[sidra]

Hey Everyone!
I have only had discus-itis for three months now. I started with a 29 gal and have added two 10 gals (to house my starter fish who cycled my tank and the other for hospital/QT)

I am purchasing a 75 gal tank next month (see photo). Since I rent my house (it's small), this will be my last tank prior to eviction. LOL. SO! It's going to have to be awesome. I have been starting to plan for this tank and thought who better to help me get it right the first time than the members of this forum. No, I'm not sucking up. I thought it might be fun this way.

What is set in stone so far is this: The tank will have discus!!! It will have a natural theme and live plants.

Here are the items I could use help with:

1. Substrate: Natural-looking pebbles, sand or gravel?

2. Filtration: Was thinking Eheim wet/dry. What do you recommend in a planted, graveled tank?

3. Plants: Looking for live plants with interesting shape and color and thrive in discus conditions

4. Other fish: Was thinking of a small school of cardinals, neons or rummy-nose tetras. But mainly just discus!

5. Tank lay-out: Was thinking of a nice big piece of driftwood and maybe a bulkhead or something to change the landscape a bit.

6. How many discus? Right now I have four and plan to get a couple of violet reflections from Cary. Six or seven would be the max huh?

Anyone who has time and creative ideas I would appreciate your input. I want to make this a really awesome tank and promise to provide pix.

Thanks,
Kristen

[Eddie]

Sounds like fun Kristen,
I don't have a planted tank so sorry I can't give any advice. I'm sure you will get lots though. I hope it turns out just like you want. When it's all said and done drop some pics. I'd like to see it. :)

[Wahter]

What size discus are you getting? I'd recommend you grow the discus out first to around 5" or so in a bare bottom tank, feed heavily, do lots of water changes and THEN think about having a planted show tank.

[sidra]

I already have four discus ranging in size from 2" to 4". I have been growing them out in planted tank. It hasn't been easy but I've got it figured out (just lots of w/c, cleaning and care). They are doing well now and growing out very nicely. There are pics of my fish and tank in the gallery.

Thanks,

Kristen

[ricmod]

Greetings; I'll start with a couple of suggestions. Two inches of Florite covered by an inch of Silica Sand. Fitting two shop lights in hood, even if you have to do some retro fitting. C02 injection, DIY to save money. Crytocoryne, Wendtii red, Anacharis, Ludwigia, Sagittaria, Amazon sword, Chain sword, Tiger lotus red.
Rich

[Wahter]

If you're ambitious, you can create a scaled down version what Jeffrey Senske setup:

Jeffrey Senske @ aquariumdesigngroup.com (http://showcase.aquatic-gardeners.org/2004.cgi?&Scale=3&op=showcase&category=0&vol=3&id=141)

All the info's there. :D

[sidra]

Wahter, Thanks for that link. Some awesome tanks. I do like the one you referred to because it's natural and planted but it does not detract from the discus.

Thanks

Kristen

[markl323]

Subtrate: white sand will bring out the colors of your discus best. But you might have to replace fertilizer pellets, sticks under the sand every six months. You don't have to do this if you use Flourite, it lasts for a life time. It is expensive and has the brown/red color you might not like.

Filtration: if you have plants, you will definitely want to inject CO2 into the water and a canister model is perfect for this. It allows you to place the CO2 reactor outside of your tank, making the aquarium more attractive.

Number of discus: having a lot of heathy plants will keep your nitrate level low. Therefore, you will be able to keep more discus in a planted tank than a bare bottom tank. You can keep adding discus until your nitrate level is approaching 15ppm, which is optimal for your plants.

HTH,

Mark

[Don_Lee]

Hmmm, it is so great to plan for a new tank! If you are keeping plants, I would look into Seachem products like Flourite or Onyx. Flourite comes in natural or red colors and is gravel like, while Onyx comes in kind of a dark grey/black and comes in sand or gravel like substance. Personally I would go with Flourite. Lighting is going to be important for plants, I would think about some compact flourescent lights to average somewhere around 2-3 watts/gallon. When I was still in the states AH Supply had some great light/reflector setups that you could wire yourself, I did it so ANYONE can, lol. I would not add CO2 right away unless you are familiar with it, you may find that good lighting and substrate will give you enough good plant growth w/o the complexity or cost of CO2. For filtration I would have to go external filter, best quality is Eheim but there are other less expensive options. Probably best to start with at least 4 discus........As far as plants start looking around at some sites and see what you like, tropica.dk has a great site that shows the plants and gives much good information too. I have managed to get a pretty good start with basic lighting with a Triton tube, substrate mixed with EcoComplete, which is another good substrate additon as Seachem is big bucks in the UK. I have hygro that is growing out of the tank already and the swords I got are settling in. Research, research, research..........................and much depends on how much you want to spend and how much work you want to do, ie wiring up lights etc.....
The easy way would be to buy a Seachem substrate, a good compact flourescent setup somewhere in the neighborhood of 150 watts or slightly more, Eheim filter, and of course you have to cycle the tank before you add discus so you can do the ammonia method or buy some inexpensive fish to start with. The tank will need to settle for at least a month, or you will be looking at some expensive floating fish in your tank.......
Stick around and keep asking questions!

Don

[Don_Lee]

PS-The fish you mention are good ideas, you may want to add an algae eater like a bristlenose plec or some of the other nice plecs you can get nowadays, there are some beautiful plecs available. Just make sure the plec you get eats algae if you want it to do that, some dont, i.e. zebra plec.
There are some great wood options out there, start looking out there for the type you like. Keep in mind some if not most will leach tannins, causing the water to turn dark, but that is really ok generally. Too much could cause a pH drop depending on your water hardness etc.............
Probably no more than 7 discus depending on how many other fish and how far you want to push things....

Don