New Discus

[Lt shinysides]

Hello all
Im new to tropical fish keeping, i have a Juwel 180 tank with assorted tropical fish. Its been set up for about 7 months now and all is good, i recently visited my local aquaruim and the Discus for sale took my eye so i'm looking to set my tank up to keep them. The chap at the aquaruim said my tank is ideally to small but should be ok in the short term. Any advice on what i will need would be great, he did mention i would need an RO unit as my water is quite hard but not sure what to look for.
Also i have six medium sized Angle fish in the tank would they be able to live along side the Discus.
Cheers for any help
Lee

 

[karin]

If the 180 means 180 liters, then you have no room for Discus with 6 angels.

 

[markandhisfish]

55g is the minimum for discus , and you would want a group of 6 , an ro unit isnt critical , i and many others keep them successfuly in tap water without problems. id reccomend that you stuck with the angels for now. aside from needing a bigger tank ,i think you should get a bit of experience in general fish keeping 1st. altho discus are not as hard as their reputation , they are not forgiving of mistakes and are definately not a beginners fish. if you are ded set on getting discus , i would reccomend doing some research and upgrading your tank .