Help! My fries are dying!

[khsheh]

Dear all,

I am happy that I have the fries attached the the parents and are growing. But last night when I returned home, I found that they were lying on the bottom of the tank. The lamp is still on. I then waked them up and they attached to the parents again. In this morning, the same thing happened. In the afternoon I found some died. Do you know what is the problem? Currently I have water change 50% and add a spoon of salt to the tank. I don't know why they got the disease and what type of disease it is. Do you know what can I do to save them for they are dying?

Thank you.

Regards,
Wilson.

[Peachtree Discus]

i am not sure if there is any disease. it looks like a problem with attaching. based on their size/shape, they look like they are a few days old (FS) already, so i am not sure. i think the dying may be them "running out of fuel" because they are not eating off the parents. How many days are they freeswimming? how long were they successfully attached?

looks like they are attracted to a dark area in the tank. you might try to cover the front of the tank as well. i seem to get better attachment with all sides of the tank covered for the 1st few days of freeswimming...especially with that color of discus. do you have any filtration or air running to the tank? if so, you may try to turn off all filtration and air so that only water movement is from mum and dad....just for a couple of days

[khsheh]

Dear discusmaker, thanks for your valuable suggestion! I just returned home and find some attach to the parents while many still on the bottom. I then placed a white paper in front of the tank and very quickly many of them attached to the parents again. They are around 1 week old from free swimming and in the past they could attach to the parents until yesterday. This is my first time to have such size free swimmers and I am very happy at them. Hope they can grow well. Thanks. :)

[Moon]

Why do you add salt? Discus fry are somewhat sensitive to salt.

[khsheh]

I did not know that salt will harm fry. After reading your post and do Internet search, I find that salt will harm the babies' stomach. I put around 6ml of salt to the tank which contains around 20 litre of water. I think this density will harm the fries. But I cannot return home until 8 hours later. I hope they can tolerate it. In fact, I prepare for the worst because in this morning, I found 2 died and 3 also swimming to other area unattached to the parents. Raising baby fishes is both attractive and tiring to me. Thanks for your advice.

[Peachtree Discus]

I usually cover the all sides from the day they are supposed to go FS until about 2 or 3 days of FS. at around 1 week i am looking for them show some independence - but not totally losing interest like they seem to have done.

Are you feeding the fry?


....Raising baby fishes is both attractive and tiring to me....

you hit it on the head right there.

[khsheh]

I returned home and found several fries died. I made water change immediately hoping that the remaining ones will be better. Now, some are still attaching to the parents. In this spawning, I am happy that I saw the fanstastic veiw of the many free swimmers swimming besides the parents and in the same direction. And last night, when some fries was lying on the tank bottom, I found that the parents tried to adjust their bodies to the tank bottom so that the fries can attach to them more easily. It is quite touching and I like them a lot.