Wild Heckels

[jt20194]

I am new to the forum and joined because I am interested in Heckel discus. I purchase four Heckels in Dec 2006 (2) and Jan 2007 (2) and thought that I would post some pics of them that I took this evening. The pictures are somewhat grainy since I shot them at 1600 ISO. I have them in a planted 100 gal Tenecor aquarium with an automatic water changer system that uses RO/DI water. Currently I have the system do water changes of 25 gals on Tuesdays, Thursdays, Saturdays and Sundays. pH is 6.1 and temp is 84. GH and KH between 1and 2.

http://www.taylorsclan.com/images/FISH1080/Heckel 3.jpg

http://www.taylorsclan.com/images/FISH1080/Heckel 4.jpg

http://www.taylorsclan.com/images/FISH1080/Heckel 5.jpg

http://www.taylorsclan.com/images/FISH1080/Heckel 6.jpg

http://www.taylorsclan.com/images/FISH1080/Heckel 7.jpg

http://www.taylorsclan.com/images/FISH1080/Heckel 8.jpg

Jim

[Chinaman]

wooooooooooooow.... nice one!

[OnyongJun]

Wow indeed. Great looking fishes and setup.

[Polar_Bear]

Nice looking plants. I don't know if it's just the camera but the Heckel's eyes appear to be cloudy in all of the photos. They look nice otherwise though

[billeagan]

Awesome tank! I love the tetras with the heckels its a great look

[raglanroad]

Jim,
Would you tell a bit more about how your set up works ? Interested in how you remineralize your RO/DI water, any buffer used, additives, plant nutrients etc. Monitoring systems ?
Dave

[Apistomaster]

The "cloudy" appearance of the Heckel eyes is natural. Despite the difference from the eyes of other discus they have perfect vision.
In my photos I get so much flashback that it doesn't show the eyes well. I always get the "cat's eye caught in headlights" effect with my point and shoot digital camera.
Heckel eyes are normally more grey and black than other species of discus. Only a few Heckels have that eyes are a shade red or yellow.

Your photos also illustrate well how some Heckels have a prominent dark ring that many believe only occurs in the other discus species.
Out of ten Heckels I have two that usually show the "ring" and I have come to suspect these are dominant females most interested in mating than the less dominant females. Based on your observations of your fish, do you have any ideas along these lines?

Your Heckels do this project proud. You definitely have them 'dialed in." These are very fine fish in perfect condition.
Thank you very much for sharing your photos. These glimpses that we share of our Heckels doing so well help keep The Heckel Project alive and temper the disagreements we may have about the technicalities and take us back to the aquaristics and what makes Heckels special. Heckels are truly some of Nature's masterpieces.
Larry Waybright

[Squiggy]

The "cloudy" appearance of the Heckel eyes is natural.

huh? :inquisitive:

While the eyebar on heckels is usually darker and wider than other wilds, even through the eye itself, They should still have clear, red eyes....

[Polar_Bear]

The "cloudy" appearance of the Heckel eyes is natural. Despite the difference from the eyes of other discus they have perfect vision.

Larry,
Like Joe, I beg to differ. btw I wasn't trying to denigrate anyone, but I know if I posted a picture and someone saw a fault with my fish, I would certainly want to know. The photo below is of my Heckels, you will note the one on the right has bright red eyes, while the one on the left appear clouded, in real life they both have bright red eyes, which is why I mentioned the camera.

[jt20194]

Dave, since I am new to this forum, I’ll ask if I should post the answer to your question in the DIY thread or here? On the other hand I posted a complete thread on my setup in the Planted Tank Forum that you could look at that goes into detail on how the setup works including how I re-mineralize the RO/DI water. Should you guys want, I’ll repost the description on this forum if desired. Let me know…

http://www.plantedtank.net/forums/photo-album/36928-my-planted-discus-tank-index-1st-2.html Use F5 to refresh the pictures if not all of them show up the first time.

Larry, I appreciate your kind words and will keep everyone up to date on any progress I have with my Heckels. In so far as the “ring”, I suspect that you are on to something. I say that because I have noted that this particular fish seems to have a fuller belly even when it has been a few hours since eating. I always noted in the past when I breed some domestic discus that the female’s belly was fuller when she had eggs. Just my observation.

As far as the eyes, it really is only the quality of the photos. None of the discus have cloudy eyes when looking at them directly. My lighting and tank make it difficult to shoot without moving up the ISO considerably causing grain. Further, last night I had a white shirt on and my TEK T5 bulbs were reflecting off my shirt onto the front of the tank. This was further exasperated by the fact that the model Tenecor is a Teneview that has a concave front. I just didn’t want to scare my fish by placing a flash on top of the tank. I have done this before but at this point the Heckels are doing so well that I though it best to compromise on the quality of the photos instead of causing stress on my discus.

Finally, as most of you already know the color of the eyes do change based on their mood. Each of these discus have shown light red color in their eyes depending on what they were doing.

Last and most import, thank you everyone for the kind words.

Jim

[raglanroad]

Wow, Jim ! checked out the set up: impresssed!

[Green Country Discus]

Very nice....that is all I can say!! ;) !!

[Apistomaster]

The eye colors of discus do vary from fish to fish and mood to mood.
To me, Heckels generally have eye colors that are less brilliantly red in the iris than many Blue , Brown and Green Wild Discus.

Is my observation a symptom of color blindness? I do have it to a slight degree. I see the bright red eyes easily on the other discus but it seems less obvious in most Heckels to me. It seems more toned down.

I'm not in this to argue about everything. I want us to succeed in breeding and raising Heckels. My fish are courting, and forming paired associations and I have noticed that my two best females are plump when I know they have empty bellies and that their dark ring in more prominent than the other females. I just share what I observe what is going on in their little world.

I have enough experience in contract law to put everything in carefully parsed lawyerese but this is my hobby. There are some things I cannot help. Things like the fact that I began breeding wild caught discus since 1969 and have been in the tropical fish business. So I just might have picked a few things up.

I have deliberately toned down my rhetoric and am trying to be congenial and supportive of all the contributions made by the membership that have shown an interest in The Heckel Project subforum that I asked Al to consider opening which he did and now those of us who are interested in Heckels and their future in captivity have a place to share our ideas, thoughts, photos of our Heckels and experiences.

So let's lighten up a bit. Too much pointless arguing is not going to further our cause. I know enough that I did not need a place to pretend to be a
smart *** know it all.

Save that stuff for when you have photos of your tankfuls of F1 Heckels babies and the world is beating down a path to your doorsteps. In the meanwhile just be glad we have this forum.

Larry Waybright

[jt20194]

Larry, your comments about Heckel eye colors are indeed what I have observed and I am not color blind.

I am looking forward to everyone and anyone on this forum having success in breeding these remarkable fish. I know that I am taking a very different path than most breeders with respect to my tank being both planted and having other fish from that region. If indeed the Heckels breed and the eggs hatch, you can be sure that I’ll take the necessary action to isolate them and let them enjoy their fry.

Finally, for those that need a place to hang their pictures (no cost), I am willing to put them on my server up to a point… not sure what that point is yet but I have a lot of disk space. PM me if interested.

Jim

[Apistomaster]

Hi Jim,
Thanks you. I sometimes begin to doubt why I ever bothered.

I am also doing things a little differently with my S. discus. Only the back half of their tank has a 3 inch deep substrate retained by a glass planter box I siliconed together with an open bottom. Some plants are planted in the box and others in clear plastic pots. The front half has just a thin layer of the same sand/small granel thick enough to conceal the bare bottom but very easy for the discus to hunt down blackworms that try to escape.
I believe in giving them something to do and eat between the main feeding times and discus love to hunt continously puffing water into the stones to expose a loose worm here and there.
It has combined the esthetics of planted tanks with the ease of cleaning a bare tanks.
Larry W.

[jim_shedden]

Outstanding..........thanks for the pics and the info

Jim

[mandisc]

nice beautiful heckels and tank set up. well done !

[korbi_doc]

:D Beautiful tank, gorgeous fish....neat pics; wish I could get nice pics like that of my Heckels....sure don't look like that, it's a BB, 125g with potted plants, lol.... Dottie

[Apistomaster]

Isn't that the truth, Dottie. Our members are also really good photographers. I only have a Olympus pocket model, point and shoot. Almost all my Heckel photos come out with the eyes reflecting like a cat's caught in high beams at night. Other discus come out with red eyes but not my Heckels.

[fusQer]

i too just 3 days ago purchased 5 wild heckel's (brazil). if anyone wants pix let me know. they are in a barebottom

[David Urban]

Nice discus, thanks for share them?
regards

[Darren's Discus]

Very nice heckels keep us posted on there progress.


cheers

[Apistomaster]

To Everyone:

Please feel free to post photos of your Heckels. One picture is worth a thousand words, as they say. Besides it helps keep the level of enthusiasm
high.

I think we all enjoy peeking into each others aquariums and seeing their Heckels.

Larry W.

[jt20194]

Well it has been over a year since I have posted. Since then a number of ups and downs have occurred with the tank. Too much work, too much travel and too little time to keep on top of the tank have taken its toll. Computer failures while on travel kept the lights on 24 hours a day with the inevitable outcome of extreme algae. Before that an over growth of plants that I finally took care (see picture)

http://www.taylorsclan.com/images/FISH1080/overgrown1024.jpg

Through it all the Heckels have stayed healthy likely because of my extreme automated water care and cleaning system (diagram attached).

http://www.taylorsclan.com/images/FISH1080/Setup/Drawing2.jpg

The one outcome that I find very interesting is that their colors became very dark. Although, one would argue that is indicative of sick discus in this case that certainly was not the case. All are eating very well and since I have cleaned things and added a fifth smaller domestic discus to help them became less introverted they have become extremely aggressive. Two have paired off and have started doing their dance and fin displays. When they’re doing their dance I am always amazed at how the colors around their heads and tail become so dark. One of the pair is chasing all the others around the whole tank. All are exploring the tank and searching for food. Before adding the fifth smaller discus, they were constantly hiding. I choose a smaller domestic discus since it was tank raised and was use to having people staring at it. Within a day the Heckels were out and allowing me to enter the room without hiding. What a difference. Some other things that I did was reduce the number of hours and intensity that the lights were on. I’ll try and get some pictures soon and if the discus start doing anything interesting, I’ll get the video camera out as well.

I was reading through the various threads and found that many of the members have an impressive background. I started with brown discus back in 1962 or 63 in the San Francisco bay area (Fremont). I actually have an 8mm of my first discus tank which looking back at it was pretty cool. I had a small business going by breeding and selling South American cichlids to the local pet shops. Although I have successfully breed discus back in 1996 and have had Heckels back in 1970, I never have had Heckels breed. Hopefully with the help of this forum and some luck one of us will be posting new pictures of a successful breed…

Jim

[Ed13]

Well, to be honest I once went through a stage where I really liked emerged growth. Why? Because I got to see flowers, no algae below, fish loved the secure feeling and with so much plants water quality was perfect. So I kinda liked your overgrown photos:) as well as the details of your set up.I wonder if they ever layed eggs in that dense forest while you were away.
Keep us posted

[scolley]

Hey Jim. Welcome!

Gosh, you have been posting for a while here and I didn't even know it!

Great diagram of the plumbing/electronics... as always. ;) But what I never knew was how awesome your heckels were. Not that I'm evaluating. I wouldn't know a good heckel from a plug nickel. But clearly other people do, that they LOVE yours. So I'm just tickled to see that a friend had even more to respect than I know.

I love those kind of surprises! So... one day when I decide to take the Heckel plunge, please expect a call. But until then... I'm so pleased to see you over at Simply. Sorry I didn't say "Hi" sooner. :)

[Apistomaster]

Hey there, Scolley,
You don't have to have any experience with Heckels to know good ones when you see them. This is one aspect about these fish which is no different from any other discus. The happy healthy specimens radiate their condition such that anyone can tell a sick or stressed specimen from a happy and healthy one.

[tlc]

hi heckel lovers. here are some early photos of my heckels. i have 6 wild and two F1 blue faced (imported from germany). these 2 photos show them in a quarantine tank. they are now in a tank with white sand, natural light only, driftwood, pH 5. the single fish is an F1.
trace

[Chinaman]

hi heckel lovers. here are some early photos of my heckels. i have 6 wild and two F1 blue faced (imported from germany). these 2 photos show them in a quarantine tank. they are now in a tank with white sand, natural light only, driftwood, pH 5. the single fish is an F1.
trace

Hi Trace,

have you still got the breeder's contact for the F1 blue face heckels?

thanks

Jim

[tlc]

hi jim
i bought the F1s through an intermediary in Canberra. the wholesaler is in sydney, Aust. he got them from Germany. i have asked for more and there are none at the moment. and has not been for 12 months. the wholesaler is trying to get more as they sold very well (not a surprise i think). i do not have the wholesalers email but i can forward your email if you wish. it was only a chance meeting with a uni student studying here who is from singapore- he said he knew a fish importer who had some wilds - he contacted him - there was only had 3 left. i bought them unseen. some wholsalers can be a bit tricky - he would not even tell me what LFS had bought them so i could follow up. oh well!!
but the 3 i have ( i know i said 2 - dumb moment) are beautiful. if i hear more i will let you know
trace

[ewok]

wow great tank there - definitely need to get myself some one of these days :)

[wannafish]

Hello, and good day!

Very pretty looking Heckels. Great tank also.
It seems to me that it is obvious that you may
use C02 in that planted tank. Is this true?
How do Heckels do with C02 levels, and high
light. My Heckels are always spooked. I have
high light and C02.
Haven't settled down. I read that they don't
like either, C02 or high light. Is this your
experience?

Jeff