Is air pump necessary?

[goheel]

Hi,
I'm new here (also new to discus keeping). I'm currently cycling my 30 gallon tank for discus. I'm thinking about putting 3 juveniles in there, and growing them big. I'm going to Lawrenceville, GA to pick up some fish next weekend. I'm really excited about that. :D Anyway, is the air pump necessary for discus? My tank is bare-bottom.

[ronrca]

Welcome to simplydiscus and to discus!
An air pump is not necessary as long as you have good surface agitation. However, what perhaps is necessary is at least 6 juvs as discus are school
discus and like security in numbers.
Good luck!

[goheel]

I would love to get 6 discus, but I don't think they would be too happy in a 30 gallons tank. However, I do have a 55 gallons, which has fancy goldfish in it right now. I might switch that tank to a planted discus tank in the future. I'm thinking about using the 30 gallon as a "grow-out" tank for the discus.

[ronrca]

If your discus are small, 30G will be ok. It will give them security and more comfortable. With only 3 discus, they will hide a lot and may have problems with picking on 1. You will be much happier with 6 especially once you get your 55G going. Imo, Id use the 55G bb with lots of wc's and food. Do you have a container to age your water?

[goheel]

We don't get tap water in my house. I'm using well water. This water works fine on my goldfish. I didn't have to add anything, since there's no chlorine in the water anyway. The water is is a little bit basic (pH around 7.2)

[ronrca]

Have you had your well water tested? What are you other parameters such as kh, gh, ammonia, nitrite, nitrate, etc? Have you tried aerating it for 24hours just to see if any C02 will dissapate? Btw, your ph is really nice. My ph is around 8.2!

[goheel]

Actually, I did test the water, due to my goldfish being sick couple weeks ago. Everything came out fine (according to that little chart that came with the testing kit at least). I haven't tried the aerating method. Is it OK to add warm water straight from the bathroom (heated by the house water heater)? i'm asking this because well water tends to be colder.

[ronrca]

Try the aeration test and see if the ph changes. If ph is steady, you may be one of the lucky ones to do wc's from tap. I would still recommend getting your water tested for metals, minerals, etc content just to be sure.

[goheel]

How do you do the aeration test? Sorry, I'm new at this.

[ronrca]

Np! Put some water in a container and aerate it overnight. Test ph before and after.

[goheel]

Does the container have to be certain size? For aeration, I just use the air pump, right?

[ronrca]

Any size is fine but make sure it is not covered to allow gas exchange. You can use an air pump or water pump. The main thing is to agitate the surface.

[Tek]

Before i used capped bottle to age water. Now, i'm using 5gal bucket to save water and set it at back yard for 24-48hrs. 5gal will be perfect for 10% WC daily on your 55gal tank. Before i do WC, i warm up the water by place a heater stick in and aerate it same time for convenient.

[KIWI13]

Great advice RONRCA
:thumbsup: :thumbsup: :thumbsup: :thumbsup: :thumbsup: :thumbsup: :thumbsup:

Couldnt have put it better.

Jas

[goheel]

Ok, I just did a pH test of water straight from tap. The pH was around 7.2-7.4. I'm aerating the water right now, hopefull it doesn't change much by tomorrow.

[goheel]

Just measured the pH after a night of aeration. The pH is still the same (around 7.2). KH is 35 ppm, and GH is 90 ppm. Is that GH way high?

[ronrca]

Wow! Seems you are one of the lucky ones. kh is low which could lead to easier ph swings and something to watch out for. Otherwise it seems good. I still recommend a water test/report for just to be 100% sure though.

[goheel]

Yay, this made my day that I can change water straight from the tap.:D Do I need to lower the GH?

[ronrca]

Your gh actually isnt that high. I would not worry about it. One more thing Id recommend is testing your tap water before doing a wc. Sound like a pita? Much better than having your parameters change and have a negative impact on your discus. Seasonal changes can sometimes drasciticlly change your water parameters.