Some body slap me on the head please...

[happyniu]

July 4th was a holiday. but i spend my weekend healing my fish and calling Kenny because of over feeding, they got sick... after that, i had one good weekend and then trouble starts again!! this time, same problem except more serious. i lost 4 fish in one day... they even started under skin bleeding around mouth and fin. since that i have been doing nothing but to try to keep them alive. cause? over feeding, i think. i got so worried i just started crying in front of my tank. i am afraid to wake up in the morning, go downstairs and see them because i was afraid that i am going to see more dead fish. especially after i have name each and every one of them and "talking" to them every day.

i enjoy watchig them eat, play and i even put a stereo in my "fish/living room" so i can listen to music(classical music only because i believe rock or pop and especially hip/hop will scare them).

i think i am doing every thing i can. water change, tempurature monitoring, medication, water readings, and lots and lots of tears.. not only that, i've gotten my angel fish tank sick too!!!! at this point i am so clueless i just stare at them and cry. i love my fish, just like all of the ppl here but i guess love just aint enough..

next time i order fish from Kenny i should fly him out here too~:p

so.... could some boby please slap me on the head please..:(

[gotfish?]

oh you live in LA...send me your address, il give you a good one!!LOL:wave:

[Xenomorph]

Ouch! What did you feed them?

[alxjss]

oh, u poor thing. Believe me, i no what ur going thru. What did Kenny say? Do u no what happened? Soooooo sorry!!!

[Autumn Wind]

I'm sorry you are having a rough go at it. Things will get better with the help of all your friend here ;) It's admirable that you care so much for your fish.

Take a deep breath, re-evaluate the situation and move forward. You'll get through this.
And remember less is more.
take care,
vanessa

[LizStreithorst]

Anyone who's had Discus for any length of time has killed their share. We either give up or learn from our mistakes and go on. Keep your chin up and your upper lip stiff. Things will get better.

[aaq]

how often do you do water change?I often overfeed my discuses,but i do a 50% waterchange after feeding,and never have any problem.
http://forum.simplydiscus.com/showthread.php?t=64636

[Greg Richardson]

Your problems don't sound like over feeding them.

[happyniu]

i feed frozen blood worms. hikari bio one. i have 9 discus, i feed them 3 cube at a time and three times a day. seems like they eat them all, but i guess they don't. i thought that my bottom feeders will clean it up, but i guess they couldn't.. and............... i probobaly shouldn't have added more fish when they were just heal from july 4th. Kenny's always nice. he told me don't worry and check back on me all the time..
their color turned dark, fin turn white and mouth aera was bleeding under skin. top fin down, not moving much.. the bigger the fish, the more sick they are. some of my little guys never show any sigh.. right now i am using medication, so i change water 30% every 48 hours..


i did water testing, the water was too hard, almost toped the scale. nitriad on the other hand was ok after some water change. ph was at 7.8 which was too high. i am using PH minus to bring it down 1 day at a time..

i have only had discus for about 5 month. although i have read a lot of books, they don't seem to make that much sense to me. i am a bad reader... the only i read are my US weekly and Entertainment weeklys... (even they bored me..)

at this time, Kenny is going thru some tough time. i try to comfort him instead of asking him for more help. Poor guy always put friends fisrt and now we should try to help him...

any who~~ i am really glad at least i have here~ even the in worst case, i loose my specially little guys(God please no~ i will be good~~), i can still come here and just turn green looking at your guys' fish~ :)

thank you very one~

[Tropical Haven]

Why would you say that a PH of 7.8 is too high? 7.8 is not too high at all to grow out discus, and playing around with the PH chemically is a big risk because you can get big PH swings without warning which would hurt your discus really quickly. I think you may be reading too much into the "ideal" conditions for discus which a lot of new people do. You have to remember that discus are stronger than you think. If I was you I would concentrate on the basics and your discus will do fine for you.

1. Make sure your tank is fully cycled
2. Do frequent water changes weekly
3. Make sure water that you are replacing is the same as the water in your tank. (Make sure it is treated for Chlorine & Chloramines prior to water changes.)

If I was you I would use your water out of your tap and not play around with any of the chemistry.

[GrillMaster]

Like the others have said...Just keep it simple. Aging your water is the best thing for WC's... A barrel, an airstone, and a heater. No chemicals needed if your water company doesn't add chloramines. :)

You can call your water co. and find out.

[happyniu]

Kenny called me and i know what to do now~~

what would we do without that guy~~:D

ps.. i feel bad for wasting water, i really do~ even though we are fish lovers, we should still try to conserve water other way~ like.. shower once a month~ LOL j/k~~ I used buckets to save up the pre-shower water(the cold water that comes out of your hot water pipe before the hot water could come out~) and me and my husband use that water to fill fish tanks and flash toliet~ just the little things that we can do~ since we live in LA.. water is precious~~:bandana:

[kaceyo]

Hi Happyniu,
You can't be told too many times to stop using the pH minus. 7.8 is fine. Just add dechlorinater/dechloramin like Prime or AmQuel. The water in LA is hard but not too hard to keep discus in. I'd start doing wc's everyday, at least while the fish are sick.
What meds do you have them on now?

Kacey

[happyniu]

Like the others have said...Just keep it simple. Aging your water is the best thing for WC's... A barrel, an airstone, and a heater. No chemicals needed if your water company doesn't add chloramines. :)

You can call your water co. and find out.


i can do that~~ i will go home and start now~~ also go out and get me a barrel~~~

[happyniu]

Hi Happyniu,
You can't be told too many times to stop using the pH minus. 7.8 is fine. Just add dechlorinater/dechloramin like Prime or AmQuel. The water in LA is hard but not too hard to keep discus in. I'd start doing wc's everyday, at least while the fish are sick.
What meds do you have them on now?

Kacey

really?? thanks!! i didn't know PH minus is bad..

i have them on anti-biotic called: Dr. Discus. from asia.

[kaceyo]

Stop using the pH minus right away. If they tell you at the pet store you need it, then they either don't know or they are trying to sell you something. Add something like Prime or AmQuel for chlorine/chloramine detox and nothing else. I'd start doing wc's every day while the fish are sick too.
What meds are they on right now?

Kacey

[happyniu]

Why would you say that a PH of 7.8 is too high? 7.8 is not too high at all to grow out discus, and playing around with the PH chemically is a big risk because you can get big PH swings without warning which would hurt your discus really quickly. I think you may be reading too much into the "ideal" conditions for discus which a lot of new people do. You have to remember that discus are stronger than you think. If I was you I would concentrate on the basics and your discus will do fine for you.

1. Make sure your tank is fully cycled
2. Do frequent water changes weekly
3. Make sure water that you are replacing is the same as the water in your tank. (Make sure it is treated for Chlorine & Chloramines prior to water changes.)

If I was you I would use your water out of your tap and not play around with any of the chemistry.

will do!!! i will go return all the stuff. i really should listen more... good thing i have you guys~~

[mikel]

making it so much harder?

I think when you fuss too much, you make a mess of things. I used to lose sleep over how to adjust my PH using PH up or neutralizers from seacham etc etc tc to make the ph go down until I found thi place, and I spoke with this guy who works at my local LFS who raises discus too. He laughed at me when I told him how I use aged water from the night before, and how I use Seacham Ph neutral along with Prime etc etc etc. He told me to just try this one...."Drain water out, use buckets and get water from shower faucet (strongest pressure), adjust temp to roughly match the tank water of 84 F, add prime to the first bucket of clean tap water. Then add subsequent buckets until water is completely replaced in the tank". I change 50% of the water every morning. I followed his instruction, and you know know what, my discus were all so much happier, and I sleep well at night. Give them good food (varied but in SMALL amount that can be consumed within 2 minutes), clean water, and be perceptive with the temp and their body language. That's all you need to do. Your water from LA is perfectly fine for these discus!!!!!!! Why are you fussing and causing so more trouble when there should be none? Relax and let it go. Do your best to be diligent, and enjoy the hobby and your watery pets! By the way, everne makes mistakes...the difference is to learn from them! Good luck! :)mike

[Kindredspirit]

since we live in LA.. water is precious~~:bandana:

It is? Why?

[Kindredspirit]

Your water from LA is perfectly fine for these discus!!!!!!!

Yup. And....there is no rationing down there is there?;)

[April]

yes..your water is precious..cause you guys have to borrow water and power from us up here. canada. : )

[happyniu]

yes..your water is precious..cause you guys have to borrow water and power from us up here. canada. : )

you know it~~
LA have been in record dry years over a decade now.. (we almost burned down hollywood~ LOL) so we are doing the whole conservation thing~

[happyniu]

making it so much harder?

I think when you fuss too much, you make a mess of things. I used to lose sleep over how to adjust my PH using PH up or neutralizers from seacham etc etc tc to make the ph go down until I found thi place, and I spoke with this guy who works at my local LFS who raises discus too. He laughed at me when I told him how I use aged water from the night before, and how I use Seacham Ph neutral along with Prime etc etc etc. He told me to just try this one...."Drain water out, use buckets and get water from shower faucet (strongest pressure), adjust temp to roughly match the tank water of 84 F, add prime to the first bucket of clean tap water. Then add subsequent buckets until water is completely replaced in the tank". I change 50% of the water every morning. I followed his instruction, and you know know what, my discus were all so much happier, and I sleep well at night. Give them good food (varied but in SMALL amount that can be consumed within 2 minutes), clean water, and be perceptive with the temp and their body language. That's all you need to do. Your water from LA is perfectly fine for these discus!!!!!!! Why are you fussing and causing so more trouble when there should be none? Relax and let it go. Do your best to be diligent, and enjoy the hobby and your watery pets! By the way, everne makes mistakes...the difference is to learn from them! Good luck! :)mike


you are right~ i am not lossing sleep over it but worse.. i am lossing hair over the stress.. :p personally, i'd choose hair over sleep. :p

but i should try your method. just relax a little~

[Wahter]

i probobaly shouldn't have added more fish when they were just heal from july 4th.

You should always quarantine all new fish - just in case they are carrying something. I think just about everyone has made that mistake at one time. :) I know I have.

Just make sure you don't make the same mistake over and over again and again - you'll be fine. :)



Walter

[doc3toes]

yes..your water is precious..cause you guys have to borrow water and power from us up here. canada. : )

yeah, "borrow" water.:angry:

Any way. Everyone here is right. Keep it simple. Leave the pH alone and up the water changes. I water my plants and lawn with my waste water. I too agree that is important to conserve. if you can post pics of the sick fish it might help too. someone might recognize the signs of disease. good luck.:o

[mikel]

Yeah! recycle to the plants! I siphon all my fish water into nice 5 gallon buckets, then haul them all out to my garden, and boy, you should have seen how beautiful my tree peonies, roses and clematis bloomed this year...not to mention how big my four younn magonlia trees have grown. I havnt watered my gardens once this year, but its kinda exhausing carrying buckets outside. But this keeps my water bill manageable. mike