Discus satisfaction at last

[chris]

Hello I have been into Discus fish for about a Year now, with very little success. I have a 3ft tank holding Approx 180L, I have my 5 discus in there with some cardinals and 6 corys.

Ever since I set my tank up I have had scared timid fish, They always looked healthy, my local fish store said to check Amonia nitrate temp ect,ect.

I was doing water changes every couple of days 35L, due to amonia reading being high, recently he told me just leave them alone...
I have reduced water changes to once a fortnight,

The fish are excellent hand feeding nad all the other stuff.
I can now finally enjoy them.

I use rainwater with geo liquid, and every 3 days use some PH up,
No more tester chemicals LIFES GOOD>>>>>>>>>> :) :)

Will my luck run out?????

Some picture of my Tank taken with my phone

[Billy]

due to amonia reading being high, recently he told me just leave them alone...
I have reduced water changes to once a fortnight,


if your amonia reading is high, why dont do more water change ???
Who told you not do ?? your LFS ?

[jim]

:shock: You use PH up ??!! :shock:
What's PH in your tank?? don't use too much PH buffer, fish hates it.
I try to lower PH...and you need to increase PH?? how do you make PH so low?? is it because of rain water??

[Trebs]

Rain water is typically very soft so yes PH up may be needed.

Did your ph change a lot before and after a W/C?
This may well be the reason for ammo as your tank would be mini cycling every couple of days.

I'm interested to know why you use rain water?
What is the ph and kh of the rain water before it goes in?
If you are using rain water I would suggest getting a kh test kit if you haven't already, and also because you are using ph up.

[chris]

Thanks for all your response, yes I did get advise from my LFS, I was at my wits end. I was for ever doing water changes DAILY, addressing my Amonia problems, My water was and is still testing high in amonia PH is always acid usually very low this is why I take the PH up,

[kevkoi]

U should try to understand WHY things are happening the way it is. Afterall, this hobby of keeping fish is really more about keeping good water. Basic water chemistry should be understood.

Rain water is terribly soft (no carbonate hardness, no buffering capacity). Using rain water and feeding discus the way they should be fed (which is with high protein food), will definately cause the pH to drop drastically.

pH up does not increase kH (buffering capacity). It simply raises the pH and because there is no buffering capacity the pH does not hold for long... so it drops again in a few days.

This yo-yo effect on pH cannot be good for discus which thrive on stability.

Low pH as the effect of detoxifying amonia... (ie amonia is much much less toxic under pH 6 than above 7.). Lowering the pH to control the toxicity of amonia is not recommended because at low pH levels, bacteria does not thrive.... hence the filter bacteria never fully colonises and the cycle is never completed, so u'll always be reading high amonia in the water.

This, in my opinion is a ticking time bomb. Should u ever be careless and somehow add too much pH up, some sort of buffer, etc etc thereby increasing the pH over 7, the amonia in the water becomes suddenly toxic.... and fish are skittish and will suffer.

My guess is that you never cycled your tank propperly to start with. How was the tank cycled prior to the discus being introduced? Did you monitor the cycle? (Amonia and Nitrite levels increasing and then decreasing).

[Trebs]

Let's not change anything yet. I strongly suggest you test both your tap water and rain water for ph and kh and post the results here. Also I'm still curious to know why you use rainwater?

I have been in your situation before and found by stopping water changes made my fish happier. Problem is you need to change water at some stage and the longer you wait the greater the difference in water will be.

If you can get this information we can work out a long term plan to keep your water stable.

Kev also makes a good point about cycling. If it was not cycled fully to start and the ph is unstable it forms a vicious cycle.

[DiscusMan]

I personally get ammonia in my tap water as i would expect most people in sydney experience.

Any yellow reading seems to be ok. I fit goes green then start fixing as long as your ph is low.

I totally agree with Kev and his comments are spot on. A understanding of all aspects need to known.

To get fast growth teh fish need good quality water and lots of food. If your tank is large and understocked the water quality will remain better for longer you need to figure out where this point is for yourself with water changes etc.
I change 200 litres a day in my 2000 litre setup and the amonia level is around 0.025 from memory the first one up on the scale. I am not concerned at all and either are the fish. but my water is always acidic adn i monitor that.

Regards

Wayne Tolley

[chris]

I understand what good quality is I dont have it, I need to reduce my fish quantity, that for sure,
I use Rain water because I tried tap with not much success, It just happened that they came good when I was using rain water with GEO liquid,
I will go back to tap water treated for clorine in my Breeding tank.
I have Two pairs in my other Tank,
Can someone please advise how to properly cylce a new tank......

[Aurora]

Here is Flukes article on Fishless Cycling.

http://www.discusforums.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=895

Dave

[flukes]

Before you read that you must first understand why you are doing it, have a read through this first..

Nitrogen Cycle (click here) (http://www.discusforums.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=888)

[lesley]

Hi Chris,

I use rainwater, don't have any choice. Rainwater has NO buffering capacity. I would expect that, depending what your rainwater is stored in, that you will not have any measureable carbonate (kH). In my experience, if you are using rainwater, you need a lot of water changes, leaving your water changes for a fortnight is a recipe for disaster, one day your pH will crash and kill or maim your fish.

You can buy liquids to raise your carbonates, you are going to need a kH kit without any doubt, with rainwater you must know those measurements.

I use a mix of calcium chloride, calcium sulphate, magnesium sulphate, and bentonite (which is what the geoliquid you are using contains). This is cheaper than buying the commercial products from an LFS or over the net.

You can use bicarb soda or calcium carbonate to raise your pH. Bicarb soda will give you carbonate hardness also, however I find that the carbonates are used up quickly with this. I found the geoliquid to be good, but expensive.

HTH

[chris]

Thanks again for every bodies advise, I have learnt a bit from every one I understand the problems with Rain water, the fact still remains I have had success with rain water but, I think that If I do a 50% mix with tap treated properly this should help stabalize my PH with a GEO liquid mix or Equivelant.

[chris]

Hi Im that guy goin on about my fish finally coming good, still working out some water parameters though every thing looking good. 8)
Here is some pics of my Discus taken with my Phone dont have a digital camera yet.. :roll: :wink:

[jim]

Nice fish chris....

[Trebs]

From your earlier message you said your kh with rain water is around 4? If that's the case and you've had better results with it than tap then stick with the rain water. Just be aware there could be some variation in parameters in rain water. By the same token tap water changes as well so keeping an eye on the water is good practice for all of us.