# Need Expert Advice.. setup for discus



## badren (Jan 5, 2005)

I've recently acquired a new 55 gallon long tank I would like to 
setup as a Discus tank, w/ as much color as I can get. So for
those experts with the time please send out some pointers on
how you would go about this. I'm thinking of starting with 40Lbs.
of eco complete w/sand over top. Thats about all I've got so far.
So to save money and frustration I need some pointers ie filtration,
heating, ph, whatever you can think of. I will get a pressurized system
from florida driftwood I'm thinking with the ph controller. I've been
in this hobby for only a year and have had success w/ my 29 gallon
but its a low maintenance tank, I see that a lot of you are more
meticulous about your micro/macro fertilization than I am. Any advice
there would help too. Sorry don't want to clog up forum but I'm
planning on putting a lot of heart and soul into this one and want to 
do it right.


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## bellisb925 (Jul 3, 2004)

I wouldn't mix the eco-complete and sand if I were you. If you really want the look of sand you could do a layer of laterite(iron-rich substrate layer) with the sand on top. As far as discus go, I know nothing except that aquabotanic.com has a discus forum . 

Check it out and good luck with the setup.


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## bastalker (Dec 8, 2004)

Have you ever had Discus before?? A 55G is pretty much the minimum for Discus. The 1 Discus per 10 gallons comes into play. Four would be a great start. Juvies have a hard time in planted tanks. The mulm that forms around the base of the plants dont agree with juvinile discus very well. There are exceptions, but its less than a 50/50 shot. Most Discus enthusiasts will grow there Discus out in Bare bottom tanks, an tranfer them to there planted tank when they have grown.

Discus really thrive in larger schools of 6 or more. They tend to be less shy this way, and have a better chance of pairing up.

Discus prefer lower ph levels,but will do great in any ph as long as it is constant and doesn't fluctuate to much. Higher heat (82-84) some plants wont tolerate this type of heat, so be careful what type of plants you get. There are several members here that have succesfully done this.

I imagine you will get Shalu here for a few comments as well... Good Luck!! roud: 

If you would like to research first, this forum is great, an Carol Roberts is the man!! I mean woman....

http://www.simplydiscus.com/forums/


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## ddaquaria (Jan 19, 2003)

Make sure your tank is well cycled. I don't recommend these guys (from experience) for at least the first month or two. If you plan to plant the tank, do as much as you can before you add the discus. The less you have your hand in the tank, then less likely they will get sick or hurt themselves out of fear in the tank.

For my discus and altum tanks, I enjoyed them more when I did an easy landscape. One that did not require much pruning. Therefore I would leave out the stem plants and do primarily rosettes and anubias and java fern.


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## elgecko (Apr 18, 2004)

http://www.simplydiscus.com/forum/

bastalker covers it very well.

I had my 5 4 1/2" - 5" discus in my 40 gallon planted tank for a little over 8 months. I have a lot of filtration, canister and fluidized bed filter. I would gravel vac and do 35% water changes twice a week. This was not enough to keep up with them. The plants were looking terrible and the fish were not their best. I ended up keeping my breeding pair in a 29 gallon bare bottom tank and selling the rest. (I could not give up my planted tank).
This is what my bare bottom tank looks like, of course I can not give up plants in the discus tank either.


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## bastalker (Dec 8, 2004)

I dont mean to burst your bubble badren, I see that you have only been in the hobby for a year. I would do a ton of research. Discus are by no means a beginner fish. They are pricey as well.. If you go into feet first without doing any research, you might wind up very dissapointed... :icon_frow


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## wetgreenthumb (Jan 6, 2005)

I had just asked this same thing on the fish forum. I am glad I read this, but wish I had read it first. I am not sure Discus are for me. I would hate for them to die....and they seem like a lot of work.


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## ClayT101 (Jan 3, 2005)

Here is another discus forum that I belong to:

www.daah.com

I currently have 9 discus in a 110 planted aquarium. I have not found them to be overly difficult, but I really think it depends on what condition they are in when you get them. I get mine from a guy who imports directly from a farm Vietnam. They are all in excellent condition and have no trouble eating. I did buy one from an LFS though that was unable to compete for food with my discus and was incredibly shy. I ended up just giving it back to the LFS.


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## rayhwong (Aug 6, 2004)

I went through so many pains setting up my 100G planted discus tank.

The key thing is to wait until your tank is FULLY cycled and completely stable. New tanks can wreak havoc on discus health.

Quarantine your new discus and let it get use to you so it wont be shy and will eat yoru foods.

always have clean stable water.

the bigger discus are very strong and dont die easily. I would go with those over juveniles for your first try at discus.


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## shalu (Jan 16, 2003)

If you read posts on the few discus forums(daah, simply, awforums, etc) about planted tanks and discus, you will see that the majority of people claim that you can only have adult discus do ok in a planted tank, juv discus are likely to be stunted, and many plants can't survive the high temp in a discus tank. But the more I read, I came to a realization that there are FEW discus people who are as passionate about growing plants as people on planted tank forums like this one. So their knowledge of nutrient dosing/balancing, lighting/CO2 might be limited.

There is a common misconception that plants dislike water changes and therefore, few should be performed in a planted tank, and ---- then you've got stunted juv discus and you can blame it on the GRAVEL and the PLANTS, duhhhh!

In order to minimize water changes without completely fouling the water, people try to reduce the food they feed juv discus, and ---- then you've got stunted juv discus and you can blame it on the GRAVEL and the PLANTS, duhhhh!

People use insuffiicient lights on discus tank believing discus don't like strong lights. Oh, one might believe that 20ppm CO2 can kill dicus too, and phosphates, iron cause algae. and ---- they wonder why the plants disintegrate, blame it on the HIGH TEMPERATURE!

So you can read a lot on the internet, absorb a lot of info, but ALWAYS analyse it yourself, including this very post of mine  

OK, here is my discus experience over the past year. Having read so much about problems growing juvenile dicsus in a planted tank, I decided to do things "the right way", growing them out in a bare bottom tank, a 55 gallon. I bought a dozen 2-3" discus from reputable sources, fed them a lot and changed water daily, geez, that was a chore. Here is the problem, they would do great one day, then gradually stop eating over the next couple of days. I was thinking along the lines of disease, and used meds to treat them. Initially Metro with heat seemed effective, but with each problem cycle, it lost its effectiveness. Other meds did not help either. Eventually I gave up the bare bottom tank and moved them into my 100 galloon main planted tank. I noticed that they were doing better, eating more. At that time, I realized that the problem might have been WATER QUALITY all along. Can I blame it on the bare bottom tank? No, had I changed even MORE water, say up from 40% daily to 80% daily, things might have been different. Another conclusion was, my planted tank had better water quality than the bare bottom tank, contrary to what most others' experience. Granted the planted tank was bigger, but I was doing only weekly water changes then. But I did see room for improvement, noticed some discus would turn dark at times. Then I found out my nitrate was building up, and more importantly, dissolved organic contents in the water. The organic contents in water interferred with nitrate measurement and it took me some time to figure that out. So I tried to increase water changes, settling at 60% every other day I am at right now. The amount of food I feed is relatively constant, about 3 ounces of frozen bloodworms, which is a LOT! This gives me about 5ppm NO3 right after a water change, and creeps up to over 10 ppm before next water change. The discus are now much healthier, never turn dark again, are gaining weight. The 3-6 months period that they stayed in the bare bottom tank with water quality problem has caused some permanent damage, most of them are stunted now to some degree. Again, I can not just blame it on the bare bottom.

What kind of planted tank setup do I have? 300watt power compact lighting from AHSupply. Pressurized CO2 with PinPoint ph controller targeting at least 30ppm CO2. An Amiracle wet/dry filter. The tank is stuffed full of plants, some 60 species, they do fine at 83 Farenheit! I have some issues with a few difficult plants, but it has nothing to do with high temp. SO lots of plants plus lots of water changes give me superior water quality. But how do I stay out of bankrupcy from fertilizer costs with so much water change? I buy dry powder from gregwatson.com, cost is negligible compared to other discus maintanance costs, like frozen food, which is the most expensive NO3 source one can buy, ok, next to CBW .

Do I recommend that you jump into raising discus in a planted tank right away? No. You indicated you only have limited experience with planted tank, a low maintanance one. YOu would be better off if you setup the tank first, get the plants growing well with CO2, lighting, nutrients all in good range. 

Buy discus from good sources, your LFS is not likely the place unless you are very lucky. A few good ones on the net: Cary at greatlakesdiscus.com, Danny at discusfantasy.com, Jeff at discusfarm.us. First need to decide if you want Adults or Juvnile. 

Adults pros: what you see is what you get in terms of the color/pattern, can get away with less food/maintanance and sickness without stunting. 

Adults cons: more expensive, but considering how much I spent on medicine and frozen food, adults look like a bargain to me right now . One source of inexpensive adults is discus-hans-usa special, their adults are HUGE. 

At your current stage, I think just a pair of adults gives you the most wiggle room for beginner's mistakes. Also lower maintanance with lower bioload.

If you start with quality fish, you only need to have a few meds on hand typically:
metronidazole to treat hex, white stringy poop from fish. Best price is Jehmco.com, 100 gram pure powder.
a few common dewormers:
praziquantel for tape worm. I bought here 
Levamisole, I bought here 
Piperzine, I bought here (listed as dewormer)

Whatever you decide on, good luck.

oh, forgot, simplydiscus is the best informational site for discus beginners. Carol Roberts is the one most helpful to discus beginners. Just don't look for help from her with plants roud:


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## bastalker (Dec 8, 2004)

Ya still thinkin about raisin Discus? :wink:

Nice post Shalu!! roud: Was waitin for it.... :icon_bigg


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## GulfCoastAquarian (Jul 30, 2002)

Excellent post, Shalu. At the very least, I want to make this a Sticky in the Fish Forum. This might also be material for something in the article section.

I've never seen a more concise, yet thorough, primer for Planted Discus tanks.


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## frmrreefr (Jan 5, 2005)

After doing the whole reef thing for close to 8 years, I thought discus care was hard, I now see the error of my ways! 

Question I have for Shalu is, I have a left over RO/DI unit from my reef days and my water coming straight from the tap has a dkh of about 18! After it runs through my RO/DI it only comes down to about 6 dkh, would that be soft enough to succesfully raise discus in?

I currently have a 20 gal Tall and I plan on getting a 220 gal or 330 gal tank in the very near future to devote exclusively to discus and peacful amazonian fish with similar water requirements. And of course it will be planted!!! :tongue:


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## shalu (Jan 16, 2003)

I am by no means an "expert", :icon_redf 
6dKh is fine for discus. However, if you get higher than 0 kh, that means your membrane is old, I guess. It is now generally accepted on the discus forums that raising discus in hard water is just fine, softwater only aides BREEDING/hatching of eggs. A 220 or 330 gallon discus tank would be awesome roud: Raising juvs discus is lots of work no matter what setup you have, with constant feeding/water changes, unless you fully automate the water change. In the future, I would only buy top quality adults for the show tank.


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## tiptoptank (Mar 1, 2005)

If you use ro water only use 20-30% because lack of everything from the water will end you up is acid water land. 

I lost 3 discus to a QT tank I'm am going to move the last one over to my 55g today because he is not going to do well alone in either tank, but at least the 55 has proper water condisions 8/. I plan on buying 5 more and putting them in the QT tank to get alittle bigger. BUt, I don't want the first discus to get mixed up in the new ones in case he has some sort of bacterial infection. which is what I think happened to the others.


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## shalu (Jan 16, 2003)

Most all experienced discus breeder that I know of do NOT use 100% RO for breeding. It makes the tank very unstable ph wise. You can either mix partial tap water or add back some kh/gh using products like Equilibrium, RO Right or just household chemicals like baking soda, epsom salt etc... Just to keep discus without breeding, straight tap water is fine.


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## rayhwong (Aug 6, 2004)

Hi Shalu,
Your advice is great. I noticed my discus werent as happy as before. They were getting listless. Some of the other fish (rasboras) exhibited nitrate problems but the readings wouldnt pick up any dangerous levels. Also algae was blooming despite correct test readings and co2 levels. I suspected dissolved organics after reading your post. I did a 80% WC and the fish are all vigorous and active again. There was also alot of waste in my filter after only a month of operation since the last cleaning. Discus definitely need clean water and many water changes since they are such pigs and produce so much waste. 
So much debris and waste had accumulated in my tank and filters that my tank was about to crash soon. My normal routine of cleaning couldnt keep up.
I was reading many of the member spotlights on simplydiscus and all of them advocate frequent water changes as the key for raising healthy fish.
Thanks for your insight!


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## kzr750r1 (Jun 8, 2004)

Thanks Shalu for the insite! I too was waiting for your post and was not disappointed. 

My attempt was a complete failure back in the late eightys in a 40 long...If I knew then what I know now this would not be the fish I'd pick. For a beginner it's alot to take care of...As you sugessted, get the tank rolling first then decide how/when to really stock it. Getting over the dosing knowledge hump takes a while for some of us. :icon_roll Adding a high maintence inhabitant can only make it more dificult. 

I still pine for a try again some day but that will have to wait till I feel confident with the plant care first...Plus I need a larger tank than a 55 

The 220 or 300+ gallon tank sounds awsome.


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## Lionel (Oct 2, 2004)

Shalu, great post on the other page, but, depending on an individual's tap water conditions, i might not recommend saying "tap water is fine for discus." I would at the very least, pull water off of a R/O unit right before the membrane (effectively filtering most sediment and chlorine. breaking the chloramine bond thru the carbon block.) I personally do not trust municipal water supplies, which can change on a daily basis.


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## shalu (Jan 16, 2003)

For chlorine/chloramine, water conditioner works just fine. I use my RO unit for purposes other than the discus tank.


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## BriNeShriMp (May 30, 2005)

Is it possible to find a Discus for less than 50 dollars????? Only one fish store in the area has them for less than 50 dollars, even the smallest ones. There is a fish store 3 hours away that sells prime breed and healthy discus fore as low as 15 dollars. (Very bargain priced store), But thats 3!!!! Hours away. Any advice on finding closer places?


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## elgecko (Apr 18, 2004)

I'm not sure where you are in MD, but Joe at Enchanted Discus sells 4 - 5" discus for $25- $30. He's around Washington if I remember correctly. It has been well over year since I was there.
http://www.enchanteddiscus.com/


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## BriNeShriMp (May 30, 2005)

thanks man.


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