The time has come...! MANY QUESTIONS!

[Brunog]

Hello, i've joined this site a while back, and have been reading about discus from many different sources. Now i believe it is time for me to abandon the african cichlid world and discover the amazonian underwater fauna.

I chose to go with discus at the beggining of the summer and i have been planning out this tank since then.

The tank itself is a 70 gallons aquarium, mesuring 48" X 18" X 18", It has 2x 40W neons on top, good eheim filter and heater..

I want to get 4 Wild discus, a pair of german blue rams, 7 rummynose OR empreror tetras, 6 corydora matae, 1-2 dwarf pleco (or maybe a BN, i know they are great algae grazers, but i love the other Loricadae's... ). The discus will be alone in the aquarium for 40 days while the other fish will be in my 20 gallon for quarantine, even tho they come from a good source.. just to let the discus settle in..

I am not completly set on these fish yet, so if you have any suggestions, comments, i would really appreciate pros and cons...
To decorate this aquarium, i want to put some natural colored sand, a few manzanita branches wich will start in the middle going to the extremities, and some easy echinodorus, swords...

My challenge here... is soft water...I have always kept hard water fish, so this is a bit of a change here... i am in uncharted territories...

Now, i have experimented a bit with my water to see how low i could go with Peat and these are my results...

Aged 24hours from the tap

kh = 3.36
gh = 6.72
ph = 7.6

Same Water Aged 24hours more but with peat

kh = 2.8
gh = 5.6
ph = 7.0

Not enougth for wilds... i want it to be lower than 6.5... so i started to consider a RO-unit, but i am scared of PH crashes... and i have heard that is wastes alot of water... How much water does it waste exactly to make about 100gallons? will it take 200 gallons of water to get 100 gallons of "pure" water??


Now it might be easier to get some domestic bred discus, but i dont really fancy their colors that much, they seem artificial to me... and really wont go with my theme... Plus who said it should be easy :P

I would really appreciate any suggestions, informations!

Thank you for your time!

Bruno

[White Worm]

You will want more than 4. 5-7 juvies would be a better number (depending on size) to disperse aggression. Cardinals, corys, BN, ottos and there are many others that people have with their discus. I also have albino angels. Setup sounds good and I dont think there will be much benefit to store and age with those results. Both situations would be fine to raise discus. I'm no expert with the wilds and some say they are more difficult but I have also heard some say that they dont require too much different params. I added sand and I love it but I'm not sure yet if it will support much of a plant life. I am also experimenting with that currently. RO units waste alot of water especially if you arent keeping the waste for growouts which it sounds like you arent. To get a good 100g, I have heard that you will waste 2-4X that amount and that is at perfect temp and pressure. Peat may be the way to go but i find it hard to keep stable when changing water so often which you should do with discus. Thats where store and age would come in handy because I change straight from tap. Ro is mainly important if you want to breed and I think your readings should be fine for keeping.

[Brunog]

I am unsure where i could put so much water

to use peat, i must have 35 gallons of water sitting arround in my garage, carry it up staires to the second floor... once a week, thats a work out....

The discus i want to get are young adults... i forgot to mention that...

splitting water changes into 2 could be another option tho...

Or I could simply put the peat inside my canister, but that would mean a ph shock at every water change...

Thank you for your quick feedbacks :)

[CAGE-RATTLER]

I am unsure where i could put so much water

to use peat, i must have 35 gallons of water sitting arround in my garage, carry it up staires to the second floor... once a week, thats a work out....

:)

A 55 gallon barrel, a garden hose & a decent pump would be a better option IMO ......... and probably take up alot less space than what your using .... especially if its individual containers.

[Brunog]

Maybe i could put 2 15gallons containers inside my stand....

il look it up, the garage is not a good idea during the winter...its cold and i have to open both the front door and the garage door to access it.

Anybody here is keeping wilds at kh = 2.8, gh = 5.6, ph = 7.0 ??

ive heard it done, my friend whom im getting them from says they'll be fine... on the other hand, ive my water is acid, toxic ammonia NH3 becomes ammonium NH+4 wich is the prefered form of nitrogen used by plants... and "not deadly" in right amounts... unlike NH3 wich is in very small amounts...

I guess 50% weakly should take care of that... maybe im trying too much?

I just want to be sure... losing these fish would break my heart.

[poconogal]

I had a pair of adult wilds years ago. I kept them in PH 6.8 tap water from New York City. The water was also soft, I don't remember the numbers, though. I don't think that you need to do anything to your water other than the use of peat, if that.

Since you are planning on getting adults, I would get the small fish (rummy noses/cardinals etc.) settled in the tank first, as to add them later to a tank with large Discus, especially wilds, would be like adding food in for the Discus, and they will be eaten.

I have 2 albino BN plecos and they have got my tank sparkling, so they really are excellent cleaners.

If you decide to filter your WC water thru peat, just place the corresponding amount in your tank's filter also. This will mostly eliminate your PH changing very much during a WC. I used to filter thru peat myself to bring my 8.9 PH down, even though I have KH 5 and GH 7 out of the tap (I'm on a private well). I found that filtering my WC water, for example, thru a 1/2 cup of peat (and carbon to remove the brown tint) produced a PH of 7.5, KH of 4 and GH of 5 after 24 hours. I also kept a 1/2 cup of peat in my filter which kept my tank water between 7.4 and 7.5. When doing the WC, my PH would change approx. 0.1 and then slowly return to where it was before the WC.

Connie

[Brunog]

Sounds good...

Ive made a plan for my water storage...

I will store 2 15 gallon containers inside my tank stand (its got good ventilation, never finished putting the doors on it :D ). Il use a hose connected in the bath to fill them up... and to empty them, i will connect them to my eheim filter intake wich will be right beside them, easy :D... il test it after lunch!

Thanks for the info connie!

One thing about introducing the Discus after... i read it was better to let them settle in alone, especialy if they just arrived from the south.... wich is my case, these fish have not been QT much... i rather do it like that.... if i lose a few rummy's and empreror's so be it... i get them for nothing... discus on the other end...

I'd be surprised to see them try to snack on those, they are pretty big already...

What do you all think of hatchet fish, i heard they made good tank mates for discus? Wont they make the discus skittish always being above their heads? Or the contrary?

Thanks for the inputs..!:antlers:

[kakes11]

My dad has a few wilds in his tank, he uses water straight out of that tap. Ph about 7.2

[Veteric]

For the investment you're making on something like discus, why not drop the extra money and get a compressed CO2 system? It'll let you control your ph very easily.

[Brunog]

Because if i do that, then i have to invest for stronger lights... then i'll have to add fertilizers... No thank you!

Maybe at some point il want to have a fully planted tank, but for now, just a few swords and some java moss on my branches will compliment this aquarium perfectly...

Plus i already have all the equipment, the aquarium is already cycled, it used to contain 17 cyprichromis leptosoma, but i left for the summer to visit europe and sold everything... left the tank running home with 1 labidochromis hongi, only to keep the cycle... Now i've started lowering the PH, no peat yet... if i lower it to quickly il just kill my bacteria...

I used to age my water before, it suits me perfectly... simple, and doesnt take too much time...

i dont have time to prune a high-tech tank, i have time for feedings and Water changes twice a week, that's all...

[Dood Lee]

Because if i do that, then i have to invest for stronger lights... then i'll have to add fertilizers... No thank you!


Says who? co2 can only benefit plants, even in low light set-ups. You just don't have to inject as much as you normally would with the high light set-ups. In your case, buying co2 equipment probably won't be necessary since your goal isn't to have a fully planted tank.

[Brunog]

Maybe in a while, but for now im going to stick to low tech, because i dont really have the money for that...

it would cost me about 250$ can to install...

it would be awesome to have tho...

but if i put too much co2 il have serious algae problems...

[Dood Lee]

but if i put too much co2 il have serious algae problems...

Where are you getting your information from? Too much co2 will kill your fish before you get algae. Excess light and (unbalanced) nutrient levels cause algae blooms.

www.rexgrigg.com

Read up on planted tanks on Rex Grigg's site. He details how to set up both high light and low light tanks.

[Brunog]

Thanks for the info :P

i am a plant newb... well... that was obvious ...

[Brunog]

Well...thanks everybody for your time and help...

preparing the tank tonigh, i found that the bottom of the tank had a very small crack...

i emptied everything...

no more discus for me...

Thanks again everyone...

This is the end for me

-Bruno