a few questions about keeping discus

[lilit]

hi everyone

i am new in keeping discus. i have a 200Litre tank (55gallon) with 5 small discus, a school of tetras and a whiptail catfish. the tap water where i live is above 8 ph and is really hard. so i bought seachem discus buffer. does anyone have any experience with using this product? im having trouble keeping the ph/hardness stable..is that because i just started using it and it needs a bit of time to stabilize. im aware that discus are able to live in hard alkaline water but i want to eventually breed them so i rather have the right water conditions. ive also read that soft water is really unpredictable in its ph because it has no buffering capacity, so does using the seachem discus buffer prevent ph crashes?

my 2nd question is how do you maintain your plants? i have anubias, swords, vals, java ferns. these plants are meant to be the easier ones to care for but they all seem to be dieing except for the anubias. i dont use plant fertilizer and i dont want to. would you recommend a DIY c02 system?

what is peat moss. is it a plant that you put in your filter. i cant find it at my local aquarium stores. or is it a bit like carbon where you need to replace it every few weeks? does anyone use mopani wood? how much does it help? how much of it would i need to have for a 200L tank.

thank you :) any other comments welcome

[peglegderek]

i have used discus buffer before when i set my tank up it worked well i use RO water now and i dont nead to use it anymore as the water stays at a low PH "low 6's" I also use Peat granules in my filter it helps soften the water a bit and puts tanins in the water to give it that natural look! i think fluval or ehiem puts it out i forgot what the manufacturer was.make sure you have a decent plant lighting system for your tank also! thats what i do others will probably have diferent recomendations.

[Orange Crush]

You have plants in your tank that have varying needs. Some are low light (fern and anubias) some are high light (vals), some need CO2 (vals) others do not like it (anubias). All need ferts but the anubias need them the least which is prob why they are the only ones doing ok.
You need to balance ferts, light and CO2 for healthy plants. If you do not have bright lighting you do not need to balance that with CO2 but you have plants that need CO2. You could use Seachem Flourish Excel for the needed CO2 but it will melt your vals.
Basically you need to decide if you want a high tech tank (CO2 and high lighting) or if you want low light no CO2 tank. Which ever way you decide some of the plants you have are not going to be happy and will probably die. Dying, rotting plants will foul your water.

However, all that being said since you are new to discus and they are young you are much better off forgoing plants and substrate altogether. Most newbies fail when they try to raise discus in a planted tank. Up to you though.

[Orange Crush]

I love mopani wood myself bacause I love the tea colored water.
I would not recommend peat moss or chemicals to adjust the pH or hardness because it will lower your pH and soften the water so when you do a water change the pH and hardness will go back up then drop down over time fromthe peat. Your water perams will be all over the place and discus do not like that. They want stable water even if it is hard and has a pH of 8.

[tbird22771]

I did use the Discus Buffer for a very short period of time when I first got my discus, and put it to the back of the supply shelf rather quickly. My tap water is also very hard and all the buffer did was make my tank unstable, the ph would be lower after an evening water change but be right back up by the next morning. I have gone to using a mix of RO and tap (with prime) to get the water where I wanted it and my parameters are extremely stable and the fish are very happy.

[CajunAg]

Any domestic discus will be happy in whatever STABLE ph you have. Don't fight your water!

[BigBruiserAl]

Any domestic discus will be happy in whatever STABLE ph you have. Don't fight your water!

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