superiority amongst discus????

[jim from sydney]

I introduced 3 new discus ( about 6/7 months old) to my tank with 14 others (3/4 months old) one of the new ones is showing aggression, wants to be "boss man" i think. it scared the daylight out of 4 of the younger ones in that it belted them around the tank and smashed them into the glass until they literally died. is this normal and how can i possibly control this in future????? "HELP PLEASE"
.....cheers....Jim

[jim]

I think there are 3 ways.

1. separate discus in different tanks.
2. put partition in the tank to separate them.
3. lots of plants/drift wood for yanger discus to hide..

[Trebs]

There always will be some aggression, especially when the balance of power has been disrupted. I'm a little surprised by the severity of the aggression as none of your fish are at breeding age yet. Also, the fact that there are 17 fish in the tank should spread a lot of aggression.

I'd expect things to settle down quite a bit once the new fish find there place in the hierarchy.

In the mean time we can look at your tank arrangement to give your smaller fish some reprieve.

[jim from sydney]

have lost 10 small ones they went possitively crazy around the tank (140liters,80%filled bare btm) they bashed themselves silly, collapsed for 1 or 2 minutes and slowly regained awareness, in the end this happened too often and to the point of killing themselves from fright. the introduction of a few larger ones was obviously too much too quick for them. even walking slowly past the tank made them go wild to the point that they wanted to jump out off the water with fright, whereas before they ate out off my hand. the last one died this morning. have now made a mesh divider in the tank to save the last few (pidgeon bloods) and put the culprit in that part on his own for the next few days rather than taking him out so that they will still get used to each other, so now wait and see......
thanks for the suggestions guys, oh yes have added a few more floating plant and driftwood.

cheers Jim

[jim]

Hi Jim...how's new 6 ft tank going??

[Trebs]

That's the first time I've heard of something like that happening. Usually different size discus mix well, often better than with discus of a comparable size.

Either you were very unlucky or perhaps there is an underlying issue? maybe water quality? The only reason I say that is your last post mentioned the small ones were really skittish, which isn't always the case with straight bullying.

[the_oracle]

Strange. Never encounter such things before. Normally, I will put discus of the same size together to avoid them from fighting or bullying. Too bad to hear that some of yours died in the event........

[jim from sydney]

Jim......the supporting frame for the new 6ft tank is made and finished. everything ready to go into the new room.....my son is about to move out of that room so it will become a SOLELY discus room. great. so just waiting for him to move in the next 2 weeks or so and then i can concentrate on the move.

trebs....the...oracle.....only 7 fish left even 2 of the 3 new ones are now showing signs of complete madness...at the smallest of movement around them they go mad in the tank,bashing themselves against anything they can find..they knock themselves cold for 2 or 3 minutes lie dead still on their side and slowly come around......the ones that eventually die have done that ritual once too often and collapse. i had them all in a 3ft tank 310 liters 80% full, bare bottom some plants. the instigator (i think) a slightly bigger "snowy" by name is still ok and has now been separated by a division in the same tank. will see what happens in the next few days but all other fish are VERY VERY VERY skittish and even when I walk in they are extremely scared....before all of this they ate out of my hand....CAN YOU BELIEVE IT????
water is fine....i can drink it...as i am very aware of their needs..(maybe i give them too much care??) they are not sick...just very scared and highly stressed.
pl keep your fingers crossed for them, it is very sad to see this happening...i have now lost 12 in 4 days. :( :( :( :(
Jim.

[weird]

i had them all in a 3ft tank 310 liters

Sorry Jim what is the full dimensions of your tank in cm, height, width and breadth ? Maybe that is just a typo on the tank size or the litre size.

sorry to hear about your losses.

[jim from sydney]

sorry about that it is 135 liters, 80% full.

Jim

[weird]

No worries mate, I could see that it was just a error, also you must be excited about the new fish room ! :D :D

I think I need some cabinents. Imagine having it like an LFS ... that would be nice.

[jim from sydney]

Dave...thanks Pal, i needed someone to tell me to look ahead .....you did just that.......
cheers Jim

[the_oracle]

Jim;
Maybe you should check your water. From your explanation, I sense that there is something wrong with your water somewhere. Maybe you should check the parameters; Nh, Kh and things like that.
Bad things do happen ocassionally but be strong, mate, there are lots of experts in here that can guide you along. Hope it will turn aroung good soon.

Regards;
Sanie.

[Trebs]

Sorry to harp on it, and I could very well be wrong, but what you describe points to high nitrite. I've had this with one of my earliest batches of fry and they went absolutely troppo.

Maybe the extra load has caused a mini-cycle? Nitrite test kits can often give fause readings so it may even be worth investing in a new test kit or borrowing someone elses to compare. Also if your ph is in the acidic range sometimes ammonia will not register and it will go straight to nitrite so it's important to test for both.

[jim]

So sorry to hear the bad news Jim...it must be so painful to see gone one by one and have no idea why it happened...

It did happen to my discus before....it was either over dose medi..or water quality gone bad...not sure what happened to your fish...

Well...is it possible that new fish bring in some sort of disease.....plus all small fish were so stress because of the new discus...make them even weaker from disease (parasite maybe)

[jim]

I was also afriad that your tank is over stocked...that might cause water quality gone bad as well (just guess)..hope large wc can solve your problem..

good luck to the rest of your fish...hope you can do hand feed again soon

[jim from sydney]

Jim....Trebs...The-Oracle....Dave.
thanks guys for your constant support. I felt lost. But now that i am getting a little settled i am analysing so that this never occurs again and better still that some-one else can also learn from my mistakes.
Firstly i change 25% of water each day. replace with Temp=30,ph=6.8 use ACE 5ml/20l as specified. I ocassionally check the new water for ammonia it is always zero. I checked with my LFS about Nh and Kh and was told to forget buying test kits as sydney water is very soft and i would be wasting my money. So i dont check these parameters. Maybe i should have?????? I dont do this with another 4ft tank i have with the standard tropical fish (no discus)
The number of fish i had (20 juniors) i feel now was too many for a 130 liter tank, 80% full. In fish numbers relative to tank size it may appear the wrong ratio. I run a external canister Rena filter at 1200l/hr. with a sponge filter as extra filtration, which should be enough considering the frequent water change. The original 17 juniors i had before the introduction of the 3 new ones, were all brothers and sisters and had never "seen" any others. As far as sickness goes I am told it is better to isolate imported fish for 4 weeks or so, however if fish are purchased from local breeders this is not as critical. Apparently imported fish can carry diseases more readily. True ?????? The fish bought were imported, and purchased from a sponser of ADA, and recommended to me.
2 more died this morning , 1 of the original ones and unfortunately also my new beautiful blue diamond, which annoyed me a little further. The remaining 5 (3 old and 2 new) appear happy and alert, eating well, and come to see me when i am around. The latter is a good sign that the skittyness they had may have reduced a bit. I hope so.
So finally then, what test kit is recommended for Nh and Kh, as i am doubtfull about the knowledge given to me by my LFS.??????
Thanks again guys, i am now looking forward to setting up the new 6 ft tank, and will go easy on the excitement of introducing new fish. By the way is there any truth in that only 1 or 2 fish should be introduced at one time to reduce stress to others?????? it may well be so after my ordeal.
Any other suggestion is very well appreciated.
Cheers....Jim.

[the_oracle]

Good luck to you, mate.
One more thing, don't give up..............

[Trebs]

Sydney water is usually soft, this is true. IMO this makes knowing your kh more important rather than less. You haven't said anything about your ph moving around too much which is good. It is certainly something which can happen when a tank is as heavily stocked as yours was. It's worth the $13 to have a better understanding of your water.
By Nh did you mean Gh?

Imported fish my be more likely to have diseases but local bred can have them as well. I'm a firm believer in a 6 week qt, regardlss of who recommends them or how healthy they look. The other thing with locally bred fish is they can often be kept with imported fish on the same system before you buy them.

In terms of stocking level you could probably keep that many juvie fish in a tank that size but it's not advisable. The more heavily stocked a tank is the less forgiving it will be when there are problems. I'm not sure what your plan was with so many fish though, were you planning to upgrade to a larger tank later?

I'd like to help find some answers for you before you look at more fish. Unfortunately I can't be too certain as to what has happened.

[kalebjarrod]

Jim,

i think your fish where scitish because of the extra stress placed on them by the extremly high bio load, when you added the extra's this was the catalist to send them troppo.

i think the water changes you are doing is great but that is only keeping the problem "at bay". if you where to forget these changes for a few days i think you would have had serious problem on your hands.

although your tests say your tank water quailty is good it was probably the slight fluctuations daily that where bad.

i agree with trebs and recommend QT for 4-6weeks, there is no substitute for this. It should be considered a "given" not a "maybe".

i haven't heard of numbers of fish recommended for introduction into a new tank.

if i was you i would cycle your tank for 6-8weeks before adding fish. it is a pain and your friends will think your mad. but if you keep fish you must also be respondsable for there "well being". adding fish to a tank you are unsure off is not fair to your fish, you have to make the right decsions for them.

the hardest thing about fish keeping is too somtimes sit and wait, pass up those beauty's you saw in the shop, leave that annoying plant in the tank where it is, etc etc it drives me mental, but it is the trick to succesful fish keeping!

[Trebs]

As for introducing new discus it's really a catch-22. From a bio-load point of view it's best to add new fish 1 at a time with a decent gap in between to let the bacteria catch up. From a pecking order perspective it's best to add new fish as a batch to disrupt the pecking order and give the new fish a chance. From a purchasing and quarantine view point it's best to get new discus from one place and not to have to go through the same process too many times.

Maybe look at fishless cycling an additional filter and adding it at the same time as a group of new discus?

[jim from sydney]

Trebs.....i may add one at the time .....just in case.....Jim.

[jim from sydney]

All excellent advice guys.....thanks......things have settled in to a normal pattern now with 5 remaining happily together. Whoever said "we live and learn".
Cheers..Jim.