Newbie with 1 death

[chupl]

Hi all, I have taken up this very difficult challenge of keeping Discus. I had a pair of discus for about 1 mth now, they are quite young, didn't want to start of with expensive ones. The tank is a AquaOne 126, quite small. They were both happily living in this small tank, swimming around and eating quite well. I don't really test the water as I don't know what the stats should be, but only check the ph to ensure it is around 6.5. Then a friend of mine gave me a bunch of neon tetras as he was going on holiday. All of a sudden, one of the discus didn't eat, was hiding in the corner, i normally was able to tap on the tank lightly and she would swim towards me but don't know what happened she just died, i think she was depressed? As for the other one, she is fine and eating normally. I don't know whether it is because the one that died had worms? I was thinking of getting a 2nd hand, bigger tank for discus with some plants. But now i'm not so sure. Any advise to a totally novice is very much appreciated. I just love the way discus just glides around effortlessly, so graceful.

[Phlipper]

Sorry to hear that, hard to tell what the problem was, and hard to tell from the picture but the Discus in the picture does look very skinny and not healthy ???, maybe simply bad fish to begin with ? Cheap or small Discus from my experince seem to be a bit fickle when it comes to survival, especially if they look undernourished.

It's not related to the death I dont think, but Discus like a nice soft tank water, the shells you have in the tank will create water hardnes, not really suitable for a Discus tank. The Blue Gouramis are not good tank mates for Discus either, especially in a small tank with no real places of retreat, Blue gouramis often tend to be a bit bossy especially if they are of the size your appear to be, this would cause the more peaceful Discus a great deal of stress and that could very well account for death. Discus are a demanding fish requiring copious quantities of water changes, the suggested is 40% twice a week with a nice soft water. The tank is way too small for Discus anyway, the two Blue gouramis would be about the maximum you could keep in it, I think you may of wasted your money buying the Discus :(

[taksan]

That tank is FAR TOO SMALL for even 1 Discus !
You would have to have been doing 2 50% WC's a day ?????????

[Proteus]

24L is too small sorry to say

[Merrilyn]

Welcome to the forum Chupl, and welcome to the demanding world of discus.

I'm sorry to hear that your first venture into discus has resulted in the death of one of your fish.. There are some things we need to look at first, before you purchase any more discus.

Tank size - sorry but that little tank is just too small for discus. They grow quite large, up to 7 inches across, so you'd need a tank of around 100 litres to keep two adult fish happy.

Tankmates - discus don't do well with other tankmates like gouramies. They are very slow feeders, and like to slowly browse along the bottom, looking for food. Other hungry fish in the tank will make sure there's nothing left for the discus, so it's much better to keep them on their own, or just with some small cardinal tetras when you're starting off.

Water - The pH of your water seems fine, but discus also need very soft water. Although sea shell look pretty in a aquarium, they dissolve calcium in the water, making it very hard, and totally unsuitable for discus. You need to get some test kits so that you can test for pH, hardness, ammonia, nitrites and nitrates. Discus are pretty demanding, as you're finding out, so you need to get their water just perfect.

Take your time, and have a read through some of the posts on this site, and you'll find there's lots of information for people just starting out with discus. Once you get the basics right, they're a very rewarding fish to keep.

So good luck, and happy reading.

Cheers,
Merrilyn.

[nicholas76]

Hi chupl

See if you can obtain Andrew Sohs book as well. It may give you a better understanding of how it all works.

Better luck with the next lot of discus!

[Jadels]

I'm a newbie at all this too. I read somewhere on this forum that 40L per discus.

I also read that if you lined all your fish along the front line of your tank and they are longer then your tank length that its over crowded as there is miost likely not enough oxygen in the water to sustain that amount of fish. Of course this is just an estimate and it all depends on what filtration you have and whether you run air pumps into the water etc. Also plants help with producing oxygen, but need CO2 to live so there is a bit of a fine art there, but i dont have a CO2 device and my plants dont stop growing without fertilisers so something must be right there??? Again I'm new so dont know everything but a few guides to help you on your way. Good luck!!

[Phlipper]

Hi Phlipper,

See if you can obtain Andrew Sohs book as well. It may give you a better understanding of how it all works.

Better luck with the next lot of discus!
Hi I'm Phlipper,not the one with the4 problem :lol: good info, wrong person :lol: 8-)

[nicholas76]

modified and corrected

[chupl]

Thank you all for your feedback, wow... so much to learn!!! :shock:
But I will keep trying. It seems like the first thing that I need to do is to get a bigger tank and test kit. I will keep reading this forum as there are so much useful information and practical too. Hopefully the last discus can hold out until a new tank comes along and I'll remove those shells too!