New Discus - Not Eating Much - Any Advice?

[maca9]

Hi

One week ago I added a new discus to our tank of tetras, loaches and discus.

The new discus I have added is in fact the biggest discus in the tank. The other 4 discus have their chain of command but get on fine.

The biggest of the old 4 is the boss, but the others don't really let his efforts worry them. They just run away briefly if chased and then carry on.

This new discus gets chased quite a lot by the main one although now it seems to be not to bad other than feeding times.

The new guy is VERY shy and won't make any effort to eat. When I put food near him he will only sometimes have some e.g. one bloodworm or flake and 50% of the times he does grab a peice of food he spits it out.

Although i would say he probably has 1 swallowed piece that I actually see each day. I feed them 2/3 times a day and in most of these sessions i would usually seem him eat and hold down 1 piece.


I know that it takes a while for them to settle in and maybe I have been very lucky with the other discus. Each of them, once they started eating, got better and better each day and by 1 week were quite integrated and willing for food.

Is it likely that he will improve over the coming weeks? or since he's struggling after a week is he likely to not come round??

Any advice appreciated.



p.s. Water is fine. Ammonia = 0, Nitrite = 0, Nitrate = 10-15ppm, PH= 6.8

 

[connorsbala]

he should start soon.... Just takes some weening to make him start.
Try and get seachem's garliic guard or something similar, and soak some brine in that for 30 mins then put it in the tank...should do the trick Worked for m DPs, yellow clown goby etc

 

[Tolak]

What size tank, and what temperature is the water?

Shyness or hiding, and being slow to eat are two signs of internal protizoans. Metronidazole, or if you are in the UK, as it appears by your time zone, dimetronidazole, will take care of this in most cases. Being in the UK you will probably have to obtain this through a vet, and a med tank for this individual will help.

This is what I do for angels, you may want to look into the maximum temp your fish can handle. Metro was originally designed for humans, the closer you can get the tank to 98.6F the better.

Put the angel in a quar tank, I usually use a 10 gallon. Increase the temp over a day or so to 90-94F. Treat daily with 40 mg/gallon metronidazole, with 50% water changes daily. If the fish isn't eating, don't feed for the first 3 days. After 3 days, get some frozen brine shrimp. Take a portion about the size of a few match heads, and sprinkle on some metro. You have to eyeball this one, make the shrimp look kind of like a tiny powdered donut. Once it thaws, mix it in & feed. Sometimes they still don't eat for a few days, but once they start to mouth the food & spit it out, the meds seem to get in their system real good. Continue medicating the water & food for 7-10 days.

Metronidazole is sold as flagyl, het-a-mit, and a few other names I can't recall offhand, used to treat hexamita & hole in the head. They usually suggest 20mg/gallon, this often isn't enough. Metro deteriorates in 8 hours, so you could do twice daily water changes. I've done this on the weekends when I have time.

I've also added epsom salt while using metro, this helps with any constipation issues, cleans out the digestive tract. I start with 1 teaspoon per 10 gallons of water, increasing by 1 teaspoon daily for 2 more days to bring it up to 3 teaspoons per 10 gallons. You will have to adjust how much you use when doing water changes. You may want to give this a try.

 

[kev_kb]

Increasing the temperature a little may be an option. IMO its way too early to start thinking about medicating.

Give the fish more time to settle into the tank. Assuming you haven't taken it from vastly different water parameters at the shop I wouldn't be too concerned yet. When it stops eating at all I'd start to worry.

Do you know what it was fed on at the shop? Mine have favorite foods, and can be stubborn when it comes to eating other things.