My discus diary (660 l planted tank and related projects)

[Johanna]

Re: My discus diary (660 l planted tank and related projects)

Pat & Jake - Thank you for the nice comments! I love getting feedback and even constructive criticism so everyone, feel, free to comment on my posts


I just noticed that old posts can't be edited anymore. Bummer. I was hoping to update the history post with links to newer events to keep them all neatly in order in one place. I guess not...

Anyway;



The new guys, the male and surviving female have moved to the display tank yesterday and after the initial shock and being pushed around by the old gang they now seem to be doing very well. They hang out together and have eaten several different foods. Stress bars are still visible and the colours a bit dark but I hope that will change in the next few days.

AND.... my first ever breeding project has begun. I moved the blue&red pair to the qt tank with a breeding cone and a small piece of driftwood for some cover. It has been about a week since their last spawn so I thought it would be a good timing, getting ready for the next. They seemed to settle in quite well at first but since this morning they have been very skittish, hiding behind the cone or wood and only swimming around when all the lights are out and even the widow is covered to keep out direct daylight. They have eaten some when the lights are out but won't touch food otherwise. Nothing wrong with the water parameters so I think they are just scared of the bare tank. I hope it doesn't permanently put them off the breeding mood....

[Johanna]

Just an update... the blue and red pair are still in the breeding tank, not particularly scared anymore, eating well and doing ok but not breeding either... The main tank has developed a diatom problem. The new discus are doing well in there, and have clearly paired but not laying eggs so far despite the male's efforts. In fact no one has laid eggs there since I removed the active pair to their own tank.

I'm slowly getting used to the idea that I need more tank space because I want a red cover pair and might even try the whole breeding thing with totally new fish (I'm thinking that Camacell might have put the beautiful new female off breeding for the rest of her life).

Also I want to introduce more dwarf cichlids into the main tank. They are fun little fish but almost invisible most of the time in such a big tank.

[Second Hand Pat]

Hi Johanna, pretty tank and all the fish look great. Sounds like the breeding pair needs more time to adjust to their new digs and I am sure they will come around. I have four blue snakeskins in a 40 breeder with two pairs. I have seen one clutch of eggs. So far both pairs do a lot of staring at the cone. My gut feel on these guys is they still have some maturing to do.
Pat

[Johanna]

Thanks Pat, I guess i was just being too optimistic at first... they were laying eggs every 5-10 days in the main tank so I though it would be easy, lol Nothing's ever easy with discus... or at least takes a lot of patience.

Today I'm setting up the 270 liter tank that will serve indefinitely as the home for two discus... the headstander female - yes, it's still alive in the small hospital tank and doing fairly well despite still having some balance issues - and the small one in the main tank that's getting too thin, fins starting to look frayed in the edges and needs time away from the bigger bullies. My plan is to try and see if I can condition these fish to move back into the main tank eventually, and if I can get a batch of fry to grow big enough this tank can also be used for growing them out.

[Johanna]

Here is the new setup. I decided to put in the established filter from the small hospital tank to instant cycle the tank and only introduce the headstander female from there as a 'test fish'. Maybe I'll give her the small one from the main tank as a friend later. She seems to appreciate the the change of scenery! This video is filmed directly after adding her, and she's still s bit spooked but after the first shock she's now exploring and looks very happy. She has been in a small tank with low water level for 2+ months, which has eased her swimming so we'll see how it goes now that she needs to work for it more. But she's eating well and in good colours, and mostly able to swim upright - so despite resting in a tilted angle I think she has a decent quality of life for now.

[Johanna]

I made a little video of a water change. This is my very old-school and low-tech way of doing it. Siphoning the waste as I drain the tank and then fill it at trickle speed straight from the tap. I keep thinking I'd like to somehow make it more efficient but not at the expense of the well-being of the fish. This way I don't get micro bubbles or pH-swing but takes 1 - 1 1/2 hours depending on how much maintenance needs to be done.

The slowness of it is one big reason I just can't do daily or every other day wc's on the main tank in the long run. I really hope the purigen and phosphate/silicate remover help with the diatom problem and also help with keeping nitrates down. I think I also need a more accurate nitrate test kit than Tetra's 0 - 12,5 - 25 - 50 -100 scale. It's really difficult to interpret around the 12,5 - 25 range.

The new tank is coming on nicely, only the big driftwoods are still floating. The single discus in there is doing remarkably well :-) just a bit shy now as I added a light today.

[Johanna]

Here's the link to the blue turq x rose red breeding tank thread; My mismatch pair (blue turq x rose red) - SimplyDiscus
At least they spawned so I hope I'm getting somewhere with them. (love that the new forum makes links with the actual title instead of just the url!)

I noticed this morning during water change that I had made a huge mistake with the 270 l tank... the last time I changed water, I didn't check the heater and it wasn't properly plugged in, so no heater for 4 days and the temperature had slowly gone down to 24C. The big female, formerly known as the headstander, didn't seem to be much affected but the small thin one that moved in there about a week ago (after treatment in the hospital tank for possible hexamita) has gone completely black and is still hiding although I slowly raised the temperature back to 29. By the way - he turned out to be one vicious fish once he wasn't bullied anymore and he's been chasing and pecking at the much bigger female almost nonstop since I introduced him into the tank. I was going to have to relocate one of them unless things calmed down in a few days, BUT now it looks like the small guy might not even make it.

Inspired by a post asking for more pics I spent a lot of time today trying to take pics of individual fish as most of my pictures are always of the whole tank. It's nice to see how the fish have changed as they have aged.

I'll post some pics here separately in a moment, if I can figure out how the thumbnails and multiple selections at the same time work on my phone

[Johanna]

And a couple snapshots from the other tanks...

[Johanna]

Just a quick update on the 270 l... both fish are ok after the low temperature shock. Even the small one pulled through and he's eating much better now and catching more food than he's been for a long time (I'm guessing the hexamita diagnosis was correct although he had no hith!). They had a showdown yesterday; the bigger female decided she'd had enough of the small one's bullyuing and put the little guy in his place. Vicious liplock battles over the afternoon and by the evening the little guy had given up. He's covered in bite marks now but doesn't seem bothered... and I'm glad they can coexist peacefully now as the female isn't interested in bullying.

[brewmaster15]

Johanna, Im glad they are doing ok for you. As a side note... HITH has been linked to Hexamita but you can have HITH without Hexamita and you can have Hexamita with out HITH.

btw.. I really like this pic..

I think I told you before that I really like the blue-ish pigeon in the middle.I like the contrast of the blue to the orange. Its a very unique looking fish even if peppered pigeon are not in vogue. I would be happy to have one like it.

[Johanna]

think I told you before that I really like the blue-ish pigeon in the middle.I like the contrast of the blue to the orange. Its a very unique looking fish even if peppered pigeon are not in vogue. I would be happy to have one like it.

Thanks, he's not everyone's cup of tea for sure but I think he's my favourite colour wise. It's interesting because that fish is almost like a chameleon. He can go from almost black/orange (when angry or breeding) to different shades of blue, with or without bars, to a very light base colour with a lot of white showing through (often related to water changes for some reason). I think he has layers of different pigments in the skin/scales and it depends on the mood, lighting etc which ones are the most visible.

[Johanna]

Where to even start this update? It's been one of those days...

So I've had issues with the cloudy water in the breeding tank... Spoiled water conditioner or what??? - SimplyDiscus

And the new checkerboard cichlids... Checkerboard cichlids (Dicrossus filamentosus) - SimplyDiscus

So of course my big main tank starts literally falling apart at the same time!!
First, one of the middle supports gave out, and while I started emptying the tank, the second one came loose. The hose of the FX6 goes through the drilled hole in the first one so it probably caused pressure and/or vibrations that eventually caused it to break off. Then the slight shift in the glass loosened the second one.

The tank is now more than halfway empty and the glass is bowing only one millimeter outwards in the middle. But it was more when the tank was full. Filters etc still running. I think it will hold like that until tomorrow when we can start fixing it.

Luckily I got help from my dad and on further inspection he noticed that there are holes for screws in the frame, exactly where the glass supports are. So we are going to switch them to aluminum braces as probably originally intended, and silicone one of the glass supports in the middle.

Now, the question of what to do with the FX6 hose still remains. Can't use the original parts to attach the hose into place because of the too wide frame.

This particular day in the hobby really sucked. I'm just happy that I have the 270 l up and running now, in case I need to move the fish and completely empty the tank. That would still be a nightmare.

[Second Hand Pat]

Wow Johanna, when it rains it pours for you. Hope you can get everything going ok with the tank and the fish. Wishing you the best!
Pat

[danotaylor]

Sorry to hear mate. Great to have your dad available to help work out a game plan with you! You 2 have got this! Looking forward to hearing & seeing the report of a great outcome!
The cup is half full

[Johanna]

So, here is what we did with the braces. So far so good, it looks ok and the tank has been in full use for a week now without any problems.

The cloudy water issue apparently wasn't due to the water conditioner afterall - or if it is, it's just part of it because I opened another bottle and the problem reappears with every water change in the breeding tank, but not in the other tanks... So I suspect it's some kind of a bacterial bloom but strangely specific as it only lasts for ~15 hours each time and doesn't happen when I turn off/on the filter for feeding, only after the water change. I even rinsed the filter materials, which were not badly clogged or anything. I've treid keeping several days between water changes and changing twice a day... nothing helps much, although I think lately the cloudiness has been a bit less thick. Very strange. The fish don't seem to mind, luckily.

All the remaining new fish in quarantine are doing ok. One checkerboard cichlid is just so very tiny, I don't know if it can eat almost anything I can give them. I should order some fry food because even crushed flakes and granules seem to be too big/coarse.