Discus Tank Mates

[walkers101]

see what you mean about the pb mate he has got a more solid black and more peppering

 

[mattlee]

ooh bonny looking fish matt

they were gorgeous but just decided that they werent the fish for me the tank is now filled with denisoni barbs and cardinal tetras and i have moved onto bigger cichlids in my new tank. discus are beautifull but lack interaction i found, others may disagree but they just floated about. very gracefull but i like movement in my tanks

see what you mean about the pb mate he has got a more solid black and more peppering

it must be an age thing

 

[Squidward]

mine lived well in tap water so dont think you have to go buying RO units etc unless you buy wild discus.

What were your water stats?

my water is medium/hard with a pH of 7.6-7.8. i tried to keep the nitrates below 40 with regular big water changes but my tap water has 10ppm nitrates. asian bred discus seem to do better in tap water as they are grown up in medium/hard water for better growth as fry/juvis and plenty of feedings. german bred discus i think might be harder to acclimatise as im sure they mainly use soft water (not sure on that but think i read it somewhere). all mine were asian imports and did very well, i have since sold them all and they are still kept in tap water and doing well. just take plenty of time to acclimatise them and it should be fine. i added small amounts of water over an hour and a half to raise the water to mine very slowly and all was well. wild discus might struggle with tap water but tend to be quite expensive to buy anyway so i wouldnt advise them for your first discus.
if you go for them i would buy fish of 5+ inches as they seem to adapt better

Do you remember what your hardness was?

Did you use an HMA filter?

I came very close to getting Discus. The main stumbling block was that setting up a quarantine tank was not an option. So introducing fish later on etc would have been a problem.

 

[mattlee]

mine lived well in tap water so dont think you have to go buying RO units etc unless you buy wild discus.

What were your water stats?

my water is medium/hard with a pH of 7.6-7.8. i tried to keep the nitrates below 40 with regular big water changes but my tap water has 10ppm nitrates. asian bred discus seem to do better in tap water as they are grown up in medium/hard water for better growth as fry/juvis and plenty of feedings. german bred discus i think might be harder to acclimatise as im sure they mainly use soft water (not sure on that but think i read it somewhere). all mine were asian imports and did very well, i have since sold them all and they are still kept in tap water and doing well. just take plenty of time to acclimatise them and it should be fine. i added small amounts of water over an hour and a half to raise the water to mine very slowly and all was well. wild discus might struggle with tap water but tend to be quite expensive to buy anyway so i wouldnt advise them for your first discus.
if you go for them i would buy fish of 5+ inches as they seem to adapt better

Do you remember what your hardness was?

Did you use an HMA filter?

I came very close to getting Discus. The main stumbling block was that setting up a quarantine tank was not an option. So introducing fish later on etc would have been a problem.

ive never tested the hardness, all i know is that its medium/hard. i just used straight tap water no special filters etc

 

[Squidward]

[/quote]
ive never tested the hardness, all i know is that its medium/hard. i just used straight tap water no special filters etc
[/quote]

My ph is similar to yours, with a GH of aprox 15*, so I would imagine yours would be similar.

I investigated the Discus option extensively. I was advised by various people that Asian Discus wouldn't last long in my water, but the German bred Stendkers would be ok.

I didn't go the Discus route in the end is I was told by almost every source, that a qt tank is absolutely essential. Unfortunately for me it wasn't an option.

 

[mattlee]

ive never tested the hardness, all i know is that its medium/hard. i just used straight tap water no special filters etc
[/quote]

My ph is similar to yours, with a GH of aprox 15*, so I would imagine yours would be similar.

I investigated the Discus option extensively. I was advised by various people that Asian Discus wouldn't last long in my water, but the German bred Stendkers would be ok.

I didn't go the Discus route in the end is I was told by almost every source, that a qt tank is absolutely essential. Unfortunately for me it wasn't an option.
[/quote]
if your getting all the discus at the same time then use the main tank as a quarentine tank. if they are all from the same place at the same time then they should be ok and compatable. its when you introduce new fish from different sources that you can get trouble. if they have all lived together in the breeders/sellers tank then there will be no plague. if you do add new fish to original stocking then its advised to put 1 existing discus in a spare tank with the new discus to see if they are compatable. this way you take the chance of only losing 1 fish instead of the whole group.

 

[Oscar Betta]

nice discus matt! Anyway I dont want to take any risks, so I'm just going to stick to some corys and tetras.