Newbie in need of advice

[BirdMan]

Hello there ladies and gents, I'm a new member here to the boards getting ready to set up my first discus tank and in general I wanted to get some advice from anyone thats willing to contribute. For many years now, I've strictly dealt with African Cichlids, more specifically Malawi Peacocks. Discus however have always been fascinating fish to me and I've been wanting to maintain a planted tank for a while now. African's of course are never too tolerant of such setups so I figured I'd give these guys a try and see how it turns out.

The tank is a 25 gallon with an Eclipse System 3 hood which of course utlizes the marineland biobag and biowheel setup. The lights in the hood have been upgraded to two 10,000K bulbs to better produce a more complete light system for the plants. Heating will come from yet another Marineland Unit and should be in about the 78-80 range ideallly. Substrate will include Red Sea's Florabase Gravel with a driftwood centerpiece....Now to the important stuff! Right now I figure about 2 discus and a couple other compatible fish will go in the tank, as well as an array of plants like jungle val, java fern, and maybe amazon swords (nothing to tough until the system adjusts). So, are there any particular discus you guys would reccomend? A couple compatible fish too? I'm located up in the Tampa area and one of the guys at Marine Warehouse reffered me to a Brian at Clearwater Discus. I'd tried the website address he gave me (which didn't work) and looked for a number but was unsuccessful, so if anyone has that I would really appreciate it. Thanks in advance!

[KD]

In general Discus do better in larger groups of say 6 or more. The 25 gallon would not fit into that scenario.
I'm, sure others have done it - I'd see if you get other replies to this.

[Bainbridge Mike]

Hi Birdman and welcome:

I would not recommend doing a planted tank for your first discus tank. Plants and discus both have a learing curve--So I would do one or the other, but not both at the same time. Most people will tell you that 6 is the minimum number for keeping discus. You could start out with 6 small discus in your 25--as long as you have a larger tank (50+) to move them to a few months down the road. If you are going to use the eclipse filter, then I would take out the stock carbon filter that comes with it, and cut some sponges (suitable for biofiltration) to fit in the rectangular box where the carbon filter would otherwise be located. I tried doing a planted tank with my first discus, and it was a disapointing experience (which I would hope to save you from).

Best of Luck,

Mike :)

[BirdMan]

Hi Birdman and welcome:

I would not recommend doing a planted tank for your first discus tank. Plants and discus both have a learing curve--So I would do one or the other, but not both at the same time. Most people will tell you that 6 is the minimum number for keeping discus. You could start out with 6 small discus in your 25--as long as you have a larger tank (50+) to move them to a few months down the road. If you are going to use the eclipse filter, then I would take out the stock carbon filter that comes with it, and cut some sponges (suitable for biofiltration) to fit in the rectangular box where the carbon filter would otherwise be located. I tried doing a planted tank with my first discus, and it was a disapointing experience (which I would hope to save you from).

Best of Luck,

Mike :)

Thanks for the advice Mike. Haha, wow and here I thought doing a Discus Tank was going to be a piece of cake compared to the peacock tanks I've done, but clearly I was wrong! I never realized they were community fish and I've heard of them being kept in smaller tanks, but apparently thats not the ideal setup. Right now, I'm a little tight on space so housing 6 small ones in a 25 then increasing to a 50 or so is going to be a little tough. Perhaps I should be considering some different freshwater species, any ideas :confused:

[KIWI13]

I would have to agree with Mike 100% on this one.

Plus I would like to bring to your attention that 78-80°F is not the ideal range of temp for discus.Try more the 82-86°F range and I would lean more towards 86°F. Discus need warm water and a low temperature range can bring up alot of health issues.

25 gallon is small but manageable. I have a 30 gallon with 2 discus and 2 angels with 6 cories and its ok. I plan on moving the angels when the discus grow up though and I have plants in there but its a bare bottom tank with potted plants to facilitate cleaning. FYI Plants like swords and anubias and crypts are doing brilliantlly well in the high temps and the swords are even sending out runners.

If you want my 2 cents, i would suggest you get 4 juvi discus in this tank and keep it bare bottom. with some driftwood for hiding places. Do frequent water changes and feed 3 to 4 times daily and try to grow them up, keeping in mind that you will need a bigger tank. Then when the fish are near adult size, you can put em in a planted tank.

Like Mike stated, i would not recommend a planted tank as your FIRST discus tank. As for other fish to keep with Discus, I think corys are great, they make an excellent cleaning crew, or even blue rams. Angels arent too bad too but you got to keep an eye on them at feedign time cause they tend to be quicker than discus.

Good luck Birdman and heres a big welcome to Simply Discus and trust me these are fish well worth keeping.

Yours Sincerely

Jason. :)

[Bainbridge Mike]

Hey Birdman:

Kiwi has made some good suggestions. If you really don't have the ability to go to a larger tank, you could go with angels instead of discus. Then try 4 angels, 4 corries, 6 cardinals and 1 ancistrus catfish (e.g. Bristlenose). These guys would do ok in a 25 gal. planted tank. 4 angels would be too many when they approach full size, but hopefully by then 2 will have paired off, and you can give the other 2 back to your lfs. This would make a nice South American community/planted tank.

Best of luck,

Mike

[BirdMan]

Thanks again Mike and Jason, thats just what I needed to hear.

[funkyfish]

if u could find a pair for sale u could put a pair in ur tank but i would go bb
untill u get the hang of keeping discus.
good luck

[Carol_Roberts]

Peacocks are tons easier than discus! I agree with everyone else - way too small - how about apistos?

[BirdMan]

Peacocks are tons easier than discus! I agree with everyone else - way too small - how about apistos?

Thanks for the feedback Carol. Yeah I guess in this case ignorance was bliss. With the Malawi Peacocks, I struggled mainly with the territoial aspects of the males (especially a german red that essentially took over the tank) and the overall agression with the introduction of females. Sure, sounds a little obvious but nevertheless it was still a challenge. Couple that with trying to maintain the right water quality for breeding and it was even more fun!....The suggestion of the Apistos is a great idea, that never even crossed my mind. I was always somewhat turned off to south american cichlids (not discus of course) because generally speaking the don't offer the vibrant charcteristics and colors of the africans. But, the Apistograma genus does offer some pretty colorful fish and they'd work out well in a planted aquarium. Sounds like a good direction to me.