New to Discus - Best ways to raise them?

[Kangus]

Hi all,
we are fairly new to discus and would like some advice. We bought 7 young ones (approx 10c size) off a breeder, and over the last 3 months a few have stopped eating and dropped off, and have 2 left :(

We have treated them a few time with AquaMaster fluke and tape worm, and it seems to help, but what do we have to do to keep them happy and heathly?

currently
temp: 28
water is on the hard side
food: usually frozen bloodworms, discus dinner, and brine shrimp
bare bottom

whats the best filtration to use?
bare bottom verses gravel/sand?
best diet?

thanks

[ILLUSN]

Bare bottom tanks are best, they are easy to keep clean, filtration is up to you, you could run the tanks on sponge filters with good air pumps or invest in a hob (i like aquaclears) or a canister (i like eheim classics).

10C size is way too small try and buy them atleast 2 inches (5cm) body length (minus tail).

bump your temp up to 30C and you'll have less problems with juvi's.

as for diet discus dinner is very good, if you can round it out with a good dry food like breeders blend flake or NLS you wont have any problems, i'd cut back on the blood worms and shrimp, juvinile discus find blood worms hard to digest and adult brine shrimp dont have much nourishment.

[Kangus]

thanks for the reply! some good points there thankyou

[lpiasente]

go into the breeding section here and have a good read. There are a few breeders that have written a diary on what they have done with their babies. As illusion said bb is definatly the way. Lots of small feeds through the day and keep up with good daily water changes 50% . Unfortunatly most of us beginners do lose a few when starting out but lucky you have found the right place for advice.

[scott bowler]

what was the ph aswell , if the water is a little on the hard side you need to sofen it , use some driftwood or a cemical sofaner.

[Kangus]

thanks for the advice all. Have bumped up the temperature to 30, and added a couple of bits of wood with plants on them to help soften the water up a bit. The ph was fairly neutral going by one of those cheap test kits.

Are any of the sponge filters better than others?

also would the temp be too hot to keep a B/N to clean the tank?