am i ready for discus?

Hi there,

I have Rio400 with arround 30 fishes in it, all peaceful.
I had tds and Ph very high, so got RO unit and tds is now 100.
Changing water 1-2 times a week (130litres ro to bring it down).
I was wondering what else do I need? What other parameters are important and who can sell some discus would be next step..

Cheers

Hi Smitas5,

this is always a difficult question to answer; and it is one that often has a debate attached.

Many of the captive bred specimens can tolerate a lot more than their wild relatives.

There is a certain amount of 'experience' recommended before getting into Discus, but it is how much experience that is difficult to gauge.

If someone quite new to keeping fish follows the rules, then they can be successful with keeping discus.

I won't go through all the questions on your tank and question your experience; but what I will do is to set out a few basic pointers that must be addressed for discus keeping if getting your first discus:

1. Select good quality discus in the first place...now that does not mean getting the most expensive (20 euro will get a good fish....and they can be found as german bred for that price....but I don't advertise for a shop as discus are ten a penny).

2. do not be tempted to buy wild-caught specimens to start. There are too many problems associated.

Avoid smallish fish with large eyes....they are stunted; avoid fish that are overly dark or have milky skin; avoid fish with 'thin shoulders'; do not buy a sick fish in sympathy hoping you could save it...the stress of being netted could kill it.

3. take care when mixing with other fish.....aggression; psychological effects; water chemistry requirements; and some other fish do not really tolerate the high temperatures usually given to discus.

4. STABLE water is more important than an exact pH etc. Stable clean water at around neutral pH will be ample for captive bred discus.

5. don't mess with water chemistry unless every important water parameter is measured and controlled...eg if things are added to decrease pH then the conductivity has to be checked to see if it low and the buffer capacity needs to measured.

6. good varied diet....frozen and dried food is good. Include a vegetable based or spirulina based food in their diet.

7. feed small and often (discus ideally require 10 to 20% of their body weight in fresh food per day...that has to be moderated down for dried food as it has a concentrated nutrition).

REMOVE ALL UNEATEN FOOD AS SOON AS POSSIBLE....discus are grazers and will easily eat moldy food containing aflotoxins etc. (death is pretty rapid)

8. temperature....about 30 C.

9. high oxygen content; good filtration.

10. zero ammonia....a must. Even if it does not kill, it will cause long-term damage and possibly the early death of the discus.

11. clean mature tank is vital.

12. water changes (partial water changes)....the key.
Different people use different methods....whichever method if chosen it should be routine and stuck to.

You could do heavy daily partial water changes (from 10 to 90% per day); or weekly 20% changes; or weekly 90% changes.
BUT what is not really a good idea is to let the tank run for ages and then suddenly do a large water change.

With respect to diseases, discus are quite tough really.
Intestinal worms are always a concern as if the water and diet are poor then the intestinal infection will have a significant effect on the discus.

Poor diet and poor water are really the enemies of discus.

In the tank, have areas for free open swimming and areas for cover. Do not have a completely over-planted tank: the discus will want a choice of where to reside.

As for which fish will mix....well that is an essay in itself.

And...this is not a complete essay on how to keep them: just a few pointers to look at in more detail.

ian

thats a great step by step set of directions on keeping discus i been thinking about setting up one myself and well done ian all i need to know has just been posted and put very simple cheers ciaran

ciaranm wrote:

thats a great step by step set of directions on keeping discus i been thinking about setting up one myself and well done ian all i need to know has just been posted and put very simple cheers ciaran

Cheers.

You'll note that I did not go into detail on stating precisly or accurately the pH and GH etc that discus should be kept.
I would say that the points are intended as a check-list from where a potential keeper does further research on the topic.

On the detail of pH etc, it is really low conductivity in a stable water that is important. For many commonly available captive bred discus, most tap waters properly conditioned will do the job in keeping them alive.
Even a reasonable degree of hardness and a slightly alkaline pH (pH 7.2 say) is OK for most captive bred discus (breeding is a different story) is better than an unstable 'perfect' (whatever that is meant to mean) pH and hardness obtained by messing around with the water chemistry.

If you can get a stable pH of 6.4 to 6.8 then that would be great; if you try for lower pHs then you may be in realms of balancing on unstable water.

Another item that is useful for Discus is the 'medicine chest':
Ummm.....it should be almost bare, but my advice is to buy a good anti-bacterial/anti-flagilate agent such as Waterlife Octozin or maybe eSHa Hexamita (I do not bother using the specific anti-bact products with discus); I also use salt in some cases.
If you need to have a whole host of medications for discus then something is pretty seriously wrong with the fish-keeping
techniques. !!

ian

good stuff and what would you suggest as ideal tank mate for them because i believe they have a poor recovery rate if they take a beaten im in the prosess of setting up an angel tank at the moment so that will be my next venture i think cheers .ciaran

I am always a bit wary of suggesting an ideal tank mate for them; but if given a list of 'hopefuls' I'd be happy to say Yes or No.

There are quite a few fish that will happily mix with Discus……but that mix will also depend upon the age and size of the discus.

The mentality of discus can change somewhat with age.

Discus can be quite tough…..they are aggressive medium large cichlids.

But, even if they can take a physical battering, what they cannot really tolerate is a psychological battering (either from another species or from another discus)

One of the problems that you sometimes find with co-housing with, say, angel fish is that the discus may decide he is tough-guy and start trying to push around the angelfish: but the angelfish may be ultimately tougher and bite-back (one thing that discus do not like is someone fighting back against them even if the discus is a bully).

Emperor tetras and congo tetras work well.
Cardinals can work OK to an extent, but may not cope with a full-sized discus (large discus are large).
Corydoras catfish?....the major problem being getting good quality species that can tolerate the high temperatures. I find sterbia to be the best.

Some dwarf south American cichlids work well……I’d favour Bolivian Rams over most others; but that is not the only one.

There are so many that will work, and so many that will not work as a mix……so I’m not going to give a listing.

Often we will hear people saying not to keep anything with Discus…..in some respects it is easy to see why that is a good option; but it is not the only option.

As Draco says, there is always a risk of another fish (especially some angels) harbouring intestinal worms in a pathogically significant amount.
One of the items of discus health that really sees so many discus go downhill is intestinal problems; the question is does a keeper wish to risk it.

A healthy discus will not really succumb to problems from these intestinal infestations….but it doesn’t take much in poor food, stress, or poor water conditions to make a discus succumb to the bad effects of intestinal worms: and that then will lead on to some other problems.


Ian

Hi there guys, big thanks for all the replys.. don't want to make this thread my own, but I aksed the question, so will try to go through all points one by one.. i like it all to be perfect.. probably cause I can't afford it not to be

Regarding experience, I have a good few years of fishkeaping, but that is way back and these were totally different times ( no chemicals, no tests, tap water only)

1. Select good quality discus in the first place...now that does not mean getting the most expensive (20 euro will get a good fish....and they can be found as german bred for that price....but I don't advertise for a shop as discus are ten a penny).

I really hope members of this forum will help me on this one, hope with some recommendations on species.. german or not.

2. do not be tempted to buy wild-caught specimens to start. There are too many problems associated.

Avoid smallish fish with large eyes....they are stunted; avoid fish that are overly dark or have milky skin; avoid fish with 'thin shoulders'; do not buy a sick fish in sympathy hoping you could save it...the stress of being netted could kill it.
Already dropped idea RE wild
I would never buy sick fish, cause i only have one aquarium.. this will have to change as I have pearl gourami breeding on the way (I think)

3. take care when mixing with other fish.....aggression; psychological effects; water chemistry requirements; and some other fish do not really tolerate the high temperatures usually given to discus.

From very first fish was thinking about discus, so here it is:
4*clown loach
4*tiger plec (the ones that grom big, will replace later)
2*khuli loache
10*cardinal tetra
5*neon tetra
2*pearl gourami
can only see 5 out of 25 red cherry shrimp (these will go once discus introduced)

4. STABLE water is more important than an exact pH etc. Stable clean water at around neutral pH will be ample for captive bred discus.
This might be an issue at the moment. Tryed twice to get a proper Digital Ph meter. Second one is jumping all over the place at the moment.

Brought water to seahorse today (3kh, 6.8Ph, 0No2, 0NH4, 0No3, 101tds, when my own tds meter gives a reading of 76).

When 20 days ago seahorse readings were (7kh, 7.6Ph, 0No2, 0NH4, 0No3, 212tds)

so as you see big changes. my tap ~8Ph and 230tds, so I have to tamper water chemistry in order to keep discus.
if I changes 130 litres a week I was confident I will add as much tap water as possible in order to get the right tds needed for discus. this should keep Ph stable..
comments on this point of view please

5. don't mess with water chemistry unless every important water parameter is measured and controlled...eg if things are added to decrease pH then the conductivity has to be checked to see if it low and the buffer capacity needs to measured.

6. good varied diet....frozen and dried food is good. Include a vegetable based or spirulina based food in their diet.
the diet I keep at the moment is 2 times a day. dryfood in the morning to all fish and in the evening dry food for cardinals and neons + frozen food for loaches and gouramis.

7. feed small and often (discus ideally require 10 to 20% of their body weight in fresh food per day...that has to be moderated down for dried food as it has a concentrated nutrition).

REMOVE ALL UNEATEN FOOD AS SOON AS POSSIBLE....discus are grazers and will easily eat moldy food containing aflotoxins etc. (death is pretty rapid)
I thought my always hungry loaches are going to take care of that

8. temperature....about 30 C.
at the moment its at 25.. hope current stock will cope with that..

9. high oxygen content; good filtration.
I have Fluval FX5 working on that one. No aerator at the moment. working on cleaner water (water is clear, but some bits are still floating). Do I need aerator if I add another 10cardinal tetras and 4-5 discus?


10. zero ammonia....a must. Even if it does not kill, it will cause long-term damage and possibly the early death of the discus.
thought bacteria will take care of that? well weekly water changes also..

11. clean mature tank is vital.
arround a month now.. possibly 6weeks running.

12. water changes (partial water changes)....the key.
Different people use different methods....whichever method if chosen it should be routine and stuck to.

You could do heavy daily partial water changes (from 10 to 90% per day); or weekly 20% changes; or weekly 90% changes.
BUT what is not really a good idea is to let the tank run for ages and then suddenly do a large water change.

What do you recommend for 2 week holiday?

With respect to diseases, discus are quite tough really.
Intestinal worms are always a concern as if the water and diet are poor then the intestinal infection will have a significant effect on the discus.

Poor diet and poor water are really the enemies of discus.

In the tank, have areas for free open swimming and areas for cover. Do not have a completely over-planted tank: the discus will want a choice of where to reside.

As for which fish will mix....well that is an essay in itself.

And...this is not a complete essay on how to keep them: just a few pointers to look at in more detail.

ian[/quote]

Hi Smitas,

First I have to say Ian has given a great overview for the intended Discus Keeper you won’t go wrong with that advice.

But or what it’s worth I'll throw my two pence worth in at your last questions,

1. I would try and get the largest discus size possible,(discus stunt pretty easy) I'm not a big fan of some of the Asian domestic bred strains and I would look for some of the German bred Stendker Discus are real good quality.

2. I just love wild caught discus, but they can be a little more difficult to keep. (Without going into too much detail.)

3. I've had bad experience with clown loaches and Discus, for me that’s a no no.

L numbers do not belong in a discus tank for many reasons, some may disagree but for me they occasionally try to feed from the side of Discus and their nocturnal behaviour disturbs the discus when they try to rest.

Khuli loach I have kept also with discus , jury is out on this one they can handle the temperature but it is again another species I would not recommend.

Cardinals are fine.

Neon's don’t like the higher temperature, so no to neon's.

Pearl gourami, no experience but I would also not consider it in a discus set up, discus do not like to constantly have to watch for competition at feeding time they can get nervous.

Shrimp will become food for larger discus if they catch them.

4. If you have an RO unit as you say just do water changes with pure RO + a good re mineraliser. This should keep your water stable and soft also in your collection container for the RO you can place some aquarium friendly peat this will keep your water on the acidic side also.

9. High oxygen content, lift spray bar out of the water this will help but the flow should be gentle.

11. 4 weeks? I would not say your tank is fully cycled yet I would wait another 4-5 weeks.

12. if going on holidays get the water nice and fresh before you go on hols 10% water changes every day the week coming up to your hols and 25% the two days prior to going, i have an automatic feeder i use and just allow it to add the bare amount of food every day which keeps the fish going if I'm away, and I mean the smallest of amounts of their preferred dry food.

1. Have you heard of any members breeding Stendker Discus?
3. I've seen couple nice setups with clowns and discus.. whats the issue with them?
RE L numbers.. any other nice fish that could replace them?
just hate the idea of them beeing lonely.. my idea
RE neons, was hoping to replace them with rummy noses or cardinals anyway..
4. I was thinking more of working out the proportions of tap vs RO and mix them in drums before adding them.. would that work?
9. the current is very strong at the moment and not even lifting the poo of the bottom. can't find any guides how to set it up tho. if I lift it up above the level, it will be messy. I have Fluval FX5
Big thanks to all

If you look down the recent posts from sponsors, you will see one selling Stendker discus.....and prices start at 19 euro !! (for smaller ones, but discus are extremely fast growing fish).

I also know that on the north side, a shop has some nice german bred discus for not bad prices.

(i'm not saying which shop because I won't advertise for a shop selling commonly got fish ....if you wanted to know who sells Nanochromis or Teleogramma then I'd say which ones).

Rummy noses are good.

I happen to keep pearl gouramis in one of my discus tanks, and that works well. But, again, all gouramis and cichlids can be unpredictable at times.

If your filter circulates water around the well enough, and there is some surface movement then as long as it is not overstocked that could be sufficient.

Younger discus benefit from a stronger current of water; but adults need a area to escape strong currents.

TDS and conductivity reading tell you nothing about stable pH.

The problem, also, with an electronic TDS meter is that it tells you nothing about the TDS.
Electronic TDS meters only give a guide to conductivity, and not to TDS.

If, however, electronic TDS meter readings are low then often that means that you have low TDS (but not necessarily), and also it could assumed that a low TDS reading means that the water is tending towards being more unstable.

Stability of pH cannot be determined by a pH readings alone.

The problem of having low alkalinity water in a captive system is, amongst other things such as fish health, the potential of an acid crash from nitric acid and nitrous acid being released into the aquarium.

Then to further that problem of a potential acid crash, low alkalinity water is also poised for a massive increase in pH during periods of light.

I won't go into the science of that here though, but it is one of the reasons why I do not favour messing around with water chemistry too much.

As for a cycled tank, a tank takes many many months (8 or 9) to fully cycle and become mature enough....and the lower the pH and lower the alkalinity the longer it takes to fully cycle.

There is more to maturing a tank than simply getting the nitrosofying and nitrifying bacteria started.

However, after about 2 months you may find that the tank is capable of holding a reasonable stock of discus....and anytime before then would require additional attention and low stocking.

I would not recommend the larger loricarid cats.....if they cling onto the sides of discus in the night then that may bring the discus down heavily.

Again, I'm not gonna write a book.... (I don't get paid)

However, I will say do not be put off the idea of keeping discus.......there are some less 'wannahave' fish that require very strict conditions in comparison to discus. They are not that difficult to keep....but they are not that easy either.
The days of 'advanced fish-keepers only' for discus (and all that crap snobbery) have long gone (as they should have done years ago)....but you still need some good fish keeping practice.

ian

Thanks, but made things less clear... I was led to believe if I can keep my tds level around 50-100, this will bring Ph lower and make water softer. And when its done, keep mixing with tap water.

I was hoping there is easier way to understand it all and make routine of it.
If measuring tds and Ph is not going to help, what is then? I definetly can't use tap water for no discus.. and icertainly can see my fish behaviour getting better and colors improving, by softening water with RO.

On the clown loaches.

I had clown loaches in with discus everything seemed fine until the loaches started getting big and out competing the discus for food also after time I noticed the loaches were bullying the discus I caught a loaches actually hanging from the side of the discus head while it swam frantically the lenght of the tank , the wound never healed properly but the discus survived for a year or so afterwards.

If you find your filter is a bit strong stick a inline tap on the outflow hose and cut the flow down a little.

The whole water chemistry is where it does get tricky , thats why I suggest getting minerals for your RO water you can make the same mix all the time which keeps it simple. It is alot more stable than tap water once you get the ratio's right. This however does require a little trial and error.

I'm trying to go back into the cob-webs of my memory to see if I ever kept clown loach with discus.....but if I didn't then I won't now either.

If they constantly harass the discus, then the discus will go down hill.

@Smita5......it is not true that a low TDS means a low pH.
A low TDS would be consistent with soft water though.

Similarly, a high TDS does not mean a high pH nor a high hardness.

If we took pure water, and added just a tiny bit of sodium hydroxide the water would still be very soft but the pH would easily be very high but the TDS and conductivity may be almost zero.

If we took soft acid water with a low TDS and added a bucket full of cooking salt then the water would still be acidic and soft but the TDS and conductivity would be high.

Hence, the confusion is probably because you've been told a porky.

If you have water with a pH of, say, 8.2 and that pH is caused by only a strong base then if you dilute the water with the same volume of RO water then the pH will only drop to about 7.9.
If the pH is due to a very weak base in good concentration then diluting by 2 may not even change the pH any noticeable amount (but you can't pre-calculate the exact amount it will change unless you know how much weak base is in the water....but it isn't as simple as that).

(don't try to understand that bit unless you already understand it).

There will need to be some trial and error with using RO water. But you may still need to add some mineral additives to balance and stabilise the water.

ian

Well for the clowns I'd say I have a year or or 2. They are tiny at the moment..
If I could add small bit of tap water instead of purchasing minerals I will (tight budget at the moment). I could afford some trial & error before I get discus .. all I need is some figures to aim for, so I could try it and see how hard it is to keep it stable..

Any good Ph meters arround? Will be returning my eBay bought digital one. It's useless.

a pH of 6.4 to 7.2 will be fine.

filtering over peat is an option.

What is wrong with the e-bay purchase?

reasonable pH meters are about 30 euro plus the cost of the pH standards. Make sure the meter can be standardised at different pHs (low, high and neutral) else it cannot be calibrated correctly.

Also, I'd advise getting one with an auto-temperature adjustment because pH is dependent on temperature.

ian

To be honest , pH is not a big concern when just keeping domestic discus once its stable. When you want to breed maybe it becomes a bit different or with wild strains. I have raised discus in pH 7.4 no problem i actually find they develop better in slightly harder water too.

Its your KH I would be more worried about one reading in seahorse was KH 7 the next was KH 3 , this I would worry about , ideally a KH of 2 is fine for domestic discus this also should keep the pH constant with regular water changes small and frequent.

As Ian pointed out Discus are easy to keep with good aquarium management, water chemistry is not good to mess around with avoid where possible, sometimes its easier to keep fish that suit the water you have readily available then trying to get the water to match the fish you would like to keep but this is not impossible but does require a little research and practice.

Well that Ph meter can indicate anything from 3 to 7 in matter of seconds.. it has solutions of 4 and 6.8. It is impossible to calibrate on both of them. It's not linear.this is second unit now.. the previous one from same seller gave me fright one morning showed 11ph
I'll return them both.. any make in particular you can recommend? the Ph now is 6.8 so should be ok.

Should I dump the tds meter or is there a figure I should aim for? Just for my next water change ill try mixing RO with tap..

Well at 7kh tds was 200
ar 3kh tds was 100
Looks related.

One thing I noticed is the Ph goes down after RO change and in 3-4 days goes up again..

I'll make up a table and measure everything every day.

I'll explain your readings later.....I'm off-line now.

ian

I'll try to explain this as best I can now in lay man terms, but I'm sure Ian will give you the spot on explanation later.

If you imagine a bucket of water with readings TDS 200 and KH 7 , you empty half of the water out of that bucket and top it up with a half bucket of water TDS 0 and KH 0 (RO water). it will reduce the readings you originally had so the new readings could be TDS 100 and KH 3. Thats where the RO plays its part and thats why RO units are particularly beneficial in areas where tap water is relatively hard (high KH) when the carbonate hardness is high the pH will be on the higher end > pH7, you can mix your RO water with your tap water to reduce the KH and then add aquarium peat because the water is now softer the peat will have more influence on the chemistry and reduce the pH to the more acidic side as the water is not as buffered.

Not the most scientific explanation but the best way i can try explain it.

Alan.

Yep.
The piece Zoom explained would be what you'd expect from a 50% dilution...ie he pointed out that you simply have half the concentration of solutes after mixing RO 50:50.

The problem is still with pH though.

One forgiving thing that we have when talking about freshwater is that we can do pretty good estimates based on simple maths because things dissolved in normal freshwater are pretty dilute anyway.

People sometimes hit problems when attempting dilutions in saltwater tanks....some compounds are at such a high saturation that simple dilutions do not change things as expected.

Anyway, I'll give an example in freshwater of something:

Imagine you have 1000 litres of pure water and to that, at 25C, you add 6.2 grammes of Boric Acid.
You measure the TDS....and you will get a value X.
You measure the pH and the pH of 6.2 grammes of Boric Acid (it could be in the tap water in some regions !!?) in pure water will be 9.62 (pretty alkaline).

Now, 6.2 grammes in 1000 litres of water will give only a very small TDS reading and small conductivity.

If you then dilute that water with an equal amount of RO water (assuming it is pure and no carbon dioxide is getting in) then your TDS reading will be virtually HALF of the original (as expected because we have pretty dilute solutions anyway) because you now have 3.1 gramme per 1000 litres.

But what the pH? the pH will drop by about 0.15 from 9.62 to 9.47.

If you then took 10 litres of that last dlution, and added 990 litres of RO water then you would have 0.031
grammes in 1000 litres (200 times more dilute than the original Boric acid water)....and your TDS reading would be almost zero.

But, what would your pH be (assuming no carbon dioxide gets in)? it would about 8.47.

If, however, you also had a few borate salts being formed then the pH start to buffer itself at around 9.2 if you diluted the water to have 0.62 grammes of boric acid.

Hence, low TDS does not mean low pH.

If you added a stronger acid than boric acid then the pH would tend to drop.........peat would be a good one (although it so happens that boric acid and peat have some pretty unusual conductivity results....but that is a different story).

As a note on TDS.....if you added a kilo of sugar to the water you would have a high TDS but your TDS meter would not really show that; but if you added a kilo of cooking salt then that would be shown as a high TDS.

A TDS meter is a useful piece of kit (a 'conductivity meter' is even better....because you know what you are measuring with a conductivity meter)....but it is how the readings are interpreted that is the most important.
Look at trends in how the TDS reading changes with time will give an early insight into whether a discus tank is heading for disaster.....ie a steadily increasing TDS may tell you that the tank is not getting the water changes it needs.

For my discus....I no longer breed discus (as my predatory fish prefer dried food to discus fry , and there are too many discus on the market), so I simply go for my tap water with conditioner and a good healthy reducing environment and good food (just to let you know what angle I come from, I see RedOx and Conductivity being the most important part of water parameters for most fish so long as the pH is not way off-scale)

ian

No offense guys, but I probably will have to get Masters in Chemistry, then come back and talk to you guys
English is not my native.. so I had to read it couple of times lol

I need to get some desent Ph meter and master test kit, then try to do dilutions..

the tds is pretty stable at the moment 80..
I will try to add water mixes of 80tds on my next water change too, will see how it will effect the rest. Sorry if it looks you can't get throughto me

smitas5 wrote:

No offense guys, but I probably will have to get Masters in Chemistry, then come back and talk to you guys
English is not my native.. so I had to read it couple of times lol

I need to get some desent Ph meter and master test kit, then try to do dilutions..

the tds is pretty stable at the moment 80..
I will try to add water mixes of 80tds on my next water change too, will see how it will effect the rest. Sorry if it looks you can't get throughto me

We'll have a good chat after your PhD in chemistry (I wouldn't wish a PhD in chemistry on anyone.....it could be 3 years of full-time hell).

I suppose the sum of what myself and zoom have been saying is that stable water is important, and that the chemistry gets complex if you start messing with it.

ian

I should have put this link up for a leisurely read on TDS.....but I couldn't remember exactly when it was posted originally:

www.irishfishkeepers.com/index.php/fforu...ved-solids-tds#99362

it gives the rough TDS for some selected fish (using different types of TDS meter) on the last post.

(it is in basic english...but still has to have some chemistry speak. )

ian

well it didn't leave me much choise.. unless going for ciclid or marine setup.
couldn't afford marine and don't like tank without plants

the fish I have in the tank was very much down all the time. clowns were very inactive. some of them actually started loosing weight. don't think tank in that kind of water would have lasted long.

like I mentionned tds went to 300 after monado was introduced and ~8.2Ph

trial and error at the moment is on agenda.
all the fish is hardy ish so hope it will be ok.

I have manado in some of my tanks, including a discus tank plus in tanks with fish requiring even more stringent water conditions than you need for discus, and the only problem that I have is with the filter pump impellers wearing out more quickly and horrible red stains on the blonde carpet in the front room !!

It is a pain to clean though.

I also through some of it into a fine mesh filter stocking and shove it in the filter of many of my tanks to safely and mildly help reduce nitrates some in the tank where I have large filter-beds in my filtration systems. It will also act to help balance redox potentials.

ian

What kind of fish is more fussy than discus?

I understand there is no need for monado in the filter once I have 50litres of it in the tank

You are a scientist aren't you?

smitas5 wrote:

What kind of fish is more fussy than discus?

I understand there is no need for monado in the filter once I have 50litres of it in the tank

You are a scientist aren't you?

There's a good few fish that are more fussy than discus....and that would include the captive-bred specimens of those fish. eg:
Black winged Hatchet Fish can be a pain; chocolate gouramis; cave-spawning tetras; many african riverine and non-rift valley african dwarf cichlids require pretty specific water conditions to not only thrive but to exist.
..and if it comes to breeding and raising the fry then that brings in a different set of stringent water for many species compared to discus.

Wild heckel discus have the same requirements of chocolate gourami, cave-spawing tetras and some species of hatchets (not commonly available) without any messing...get the water wrong with these discus and they go downhill.

wild non-heckel discus have the same less stringent requirements of wild cardinal tetras etc;

tank-bred discus will cope happily with the same conditions as captive bred neon tetras.

Now, don't get me wrong about the need to have good quality conditions for discus, but there has been years of snobbery associated with discus......I would like to see that snobbery end. as there are other fish that simply will not tolerate junk water yet don't have the gold-plated platform of discus.

Heaven help anyone who would like to clean 50 litres of manado
I also use it as a filter media (and 100 grammes does a great job in a filter bag....but watch out for the damage to the filter pump if the bag is rubbish).

As for your final question.....I am a fish keeper (of about 40 years), was head curator of a public aquarium (where I did a lot of early research into filtration systems for marine tanks), and I am also a scientist I guess (biochemical toxicologist/pharmacologist and chemist)....but I like to call myself a cynical philosopher of science !!

ian

igmillichip wrote:

smitas5 wrote:

What kind of fish is more fussy than discus?

I understand there is no need for monado in the filter once I have 50litres of it in the tank

You are a scientist aren't you?

As for your final question.....I am a fish keeper (of about 40 years), was head curator of a public aquarium (where I did a lot of early research into filtration systems for marine tanks), and I am also a scientist I guess (biochemical toxicologist/pharmacologist and chemist)....but I like to call myself a cynical philosopher of science !!

ian

well that explains it
I feel like I'm from different planet when i read your technical stuff even tho I'm just from different part of europe