Discus Question....

About two weeks ago I decided to add two young Discus, (about 2.5" diameter), to my 90 gallon aquarium. I noticed that a pecking order between the two was established in just a couple of days as one became far dominant and would chase the other around the tank shortly after feeding. The less dominant fish didn't seem like a complete pushover however and would stand its ground to go after food, then swim away after it was full.

Today I added three more young Discus, (2, 2.5" diameter), and all hell is breaking loose. My original, dominant Discus is chasing ALL the new ones around the tank. To my amazement however, the other original Discus appears to be shielding off the three new fish and going after the dominant one. It seems to be very intelligent behavior, (or I'm just seeing it that way!), however it is very stressful I'm sure to the three new Discus.

Is this sort of behavior expected in young Discus? Was adding more Discus a mistake? Any advice anyone may have would be appreciated.

no it was not a mistake you should be keeping 6 or more no less unless you have just a proven breeding pair

walkers101 said:

no it was not a mistake you should be keeping 6 or more no less unless you have just a proven breeding pair

Click to expand...

Interesting, thank you. I'm sure I've got room for one more.

this is why it is always reccomended to add all of your discus in 1 go . no offence but it sounds to me as if you have just jumped in both feet first. perhaps more research would of been in order .


edit: i have just looked at your tank stocking in your profile. is that for real ??

i know it sounds like im being harsh on you , but you really need to re-think that tank .

Mark, true I did jump in with the discus. Got them for $20 a piece from a buddy at a local fish store who convinced me they were not as difficult to keep as I thought. He gets them from a local breeder who keeps them in tap water. The electric blue jack dempseys were in with the discus and I purchased them for $16 a piece. Not to sound like an idiot here but besides for the obvious opinions that Discus should be kept in a species tank what problems do you see?

ok , well the obvious problems i can see are , serious overstocking , and compatibility issues. discus want a high temp around 30 degrees c

the ebjd will not make good discus tankmates , they will be too big and bolshy for the discus , also will like the temp lower than the discus need having said that they are quite temerature tollerant

the bala sharks will need a much much bigger tank as they grow huge , even then not good tankmates for discus due to there super active nature , size , and temperature requirements

head and tail light tetras , would be food when the ebjds get big enough , altho would be quite good for discus apart from the temperature range

glass catfish , discus temps are way too high for these guys , and the ebjd and bala sharks wouldnt be good tankmates for them as they are seriously shy fish .

6 corys , all depends on the species when it comes to discus ( purely for temp range) no real issues with anything else aside from poissibly the ebjd

kulhi loaches im sorry but i know pretty much nothing about these fish , apart from they are very shy , ( probably ruules out the balas and ebjd , not sure about the discus) the discus temps may be too high for these guys

clown pleco , no real issues providing there is plenty of cover

. i know it must seem like im bashing you here , but thats not my intention at all , im just trying to help .

Mark, no Sir, I don't take this as a bashing at all! Matter of fact I greatly appreciate the wealth of information and the attention to detail as well as the time you've taken to square me away!

This just means I'll have to convince the wife that we need another tank! In all seriousness your response makes sense. The newest fish I've added to this setup are the discus and ebjd. The others seemed to coexist ok but I do understand the temperature preferences and that glass cats are shy....

Concerning the ebjd, its my understanding that they are not at all aggressive. I researched a little on those.

The balas... Yes... They will get quite large. I should consider a much bigger tank to move those into...

I run a rena filstar xp4 and along with weekly water changes it seems to get the job done. The loaches and corys love the sand substrate. I've also got lots of drift wood with some bog wood. And I feed frozen foods, blood worms, mysis, etc.)

true the ebjd are not super agressive by cichlid standards but , not really suited to discus.

whats your goal for this tank , do you want to keep discus ? if so then realisticly you need to re-home pretty much all your fish ( unless the corys are sterbai corys which are fine in discus tanks) , raise the temp to 30 degrees c . ideally for growing out juvenile discus 25 to 30% daily watercghange . this can be reduced when the fish are subadult say around 4 to 5 inches . give them a high protein diet and feed them around 4 times a day .

you dont have to have just the discus , there are some suitable ( and indeed very good) tankmates for discus.

90 gallon is a very nice size for a discus tank
if you want a "discus community" then id suggest something like

6 to 8 discus
30 cardinal tetras / rummynose tetras
10 sterbai corys

that would make a lovely discus tank , all the fish are compatible both in temprement and temperature range .

Mark, that sounds like a nice setup for a Discus aquarium. I saw one very similar at the Georgia Aquarium last summer. I guess the guy I buy fish from is a little different in that he keeps his Discus with Freshwater Stingrays and other non-traditional tank mates. You should see his store!)

I just arrived back home. My tank is currently at 26 degrees Celsius. The Discus seem a little more settled. However the three new ones are hiding.

You bring up another excellent point though, planning... What do I plan to do with this tank? I feel stupid! A Discus tank would be nice. Perhaps I should begin to make arrangements to remove the Bala Sharks and some of the others. How about Angelfish? The Discus seem to school with them nicely.

A picture of a couple of my tank's inhabitants...

The two Angels...

26 is a tad low for discus. for now id rise it tosay 28 which will give a happy medium while you decide what to keep. warm enough to keep the discus pretty much happy enough , but not so hot as to be too detremental for thew other fish .

ive seen people keep discus with freshwater rays but it can be risky . i have seen stories where it worked well , stories where the rays attacked the discus , and even stories of the discus pecking the rays eyes out so that combination altho not impossible is very hit and miss tosay the least .

angels and discus can be mixed , altho doing this really seems to divide opinion. wild forms of discus and angels both come from the same river system and are often both encountered together on collecting trips, altho it has to be said that wild and domestic tank bred discus are a world apart from each other.

This is very interesting... I am a little familiar with Amazon river basin type fish and my ultimate goal someday when I retire from the military is to create a blackwater biosphere! I suppose I should probably dig through the Discus as well as South American Cichlid blogs on this site... Any good websites or other readings you might recommend? And again, THANK YOU very much for your time Sir!

heres quite a good site for general info , pics etc on discus
http/www.aquariumhobbyist.com/discus/main.html

and youre welcome this forum proved invaluable to me when i 1st started keeping fish , if any of the help and advice i was given can be of use to anybody else im only too happy to pass it on .

there are some pretty good discus forums and general cichlid forums as well but youre not allowed to post links to other forums on these boards so i will pm them to you .