cory catfish

[johnm]

are all strains of cory catfish ok to put in a discus tank? My temp is set at about 86f. I was at a fish shop and i didnt see any sterbai however they had several other strains.

[Polar_Bear]

Quite simply, no. Your temperature is much too high for the vast majority of Corydorus.

[Darren's Discus]

John,
i mainly keep bronze and peppered cory's with my discus and have had no troubles and i run my tank temp at 28.


cheers

[Apistomaster]

John,
i mainly keep bronze and peppered cory's with my discus and have had no troubles and i run my tank temp at 28.


cheers

It is true these two species will tolerate the warm water despite the fact it is not their optimum range of temperatures. They have been raised in captivity so long and are so hardy they have become adapted to the extremes of both temperatures and poor water quality. Both are at their best in the mid 70'sF.

If one feels Corydoras must be kept with Discus then Corydoras sterbai is perhaps the best choice but even C. sterbai is better kept at 80F or~27C. over the long haul. That is their optimum temperature.

[johnm]

other than using the bn pleco what else could i consider using at a temp of 86f

[Apistomaster]

All of the Hypancistrus plecos and Peckoltia Leopard Frog L134 do very well and in fact, they require the same warm water as Discus. If there is good aeration most of them can tolerate up to 90dF. No Corydoras can do that. They will do a better job of finding and eating the high protein foods fed to discus than even Corydoras. I rate one of these small plecos to be equal to six Corydoras as far as cleaning up food is concerned. That, their beauty and interesting behaviors partly makes up for their higher price each.
Six in a 75 gallon is a nice number. I actually have 18 in with my wild discus; six each of L333, L201, and L134.

This is an unidentified species of Hypancistrus. There are a huge number of differently marked species to choose from. They don't hold still for photos.

http://i157.photobucket.com/albums/t41/apistomaster/P6110038.jpg

[Don Trinko]

I have ended up removing the cori's. for years I have had cori's with no problem. When I put them in a discus tank at 84/86 degrees one or more eventualy gets fungus or something else. When I remove them to the sick tank(80 degrees) and cure them they are fine. (I don't put them back in the discus tank) Skunk cats gave me more problems than the plain cori's.
Most of my discus nible off the bottom so I used the cori's to cycle the tank and then removed them. In the future I will use something else to cycle the tank. Don T.