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'The Full Monty' Has Left The Building last photos

Hi All,
Just a quick update, not a lot going on to be honest, but tank not looking too bad. All the discus have been sold and I have just got some very pretty Rainbow fish species at the moment who seem to be enjoying the planted environment.

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Picture quality not brilliant, taken with my phone, close up the tank looks much better than the pictures.

Cheers,

Steve
 
I was considering getting some discus after seeing you manage in a planted tank but now I might save myself the bother. Why did you decide to get rid of them?

Sent from my SM-G920F using Tapatalk
 
Hi Lindy,

You get the bug and go for it. It takes over and you get obsessed, it no longer becomes enjoyable, especially when you finish up with pairs that want to breed in the same tank. So you set up a breeding tank and it goes on from there...but you never get rid of the bug, it comes back like an itch that you just have to scratch. My tank has morphed over the past few months where I have reduced the number of plants and taken out the carpet plants and covered the ADA Substrate with sand, only had a few Rainbow Fish dithering about. The water has never been better, the Amazon Swords went crazy, massive, and the algae problems were zero.

Then the itch comes back...you wonder, you read, then read some more, do a bit of research and by accident stumble on something that starts the whole process all over again.

See my next post with photos in about half an hor for an update to see what I mean.

Cheers,

Steve
 
So following on from my reply to Lindy, I was sat staring at my tank just over a week ago, looking at the spave and wondering what to do next. After some exhaustive surfing on the net I started looking at photogrpahs and posts on the BIDKA Site of wild Discus Aquariums.

A guy called Dave Mercer posted a video, I watched it and that was it I was bitten again. See the link below for his video, lets just say I was Suitably Stunned.



I went to visit him to see his tank, and ask loads of questions about the Wild Discus. He confirmed what underneath I thought all along, it can be heaven or hell, I could see these beautiful fish swimming and shoaling about, eating and getting on fine...or I could be entering a whole world of pain! It didn't matter I had to do it, so I did.

By pure coincidence a guy from BIDKA contacted me and told me about his Red Spotted Wild Discus from the Rio Nannay that he was selling as he was moving and closing his tank down. Okay so he lives in Hull and I would have to collect them...but the price was too good an opportunity to miss.

So yesterday I got up at 05:30 and was on the road by 6am. Seven hours later I am back home thinking s£$% what have I done, but there was no going back. After two hours of very carefully acclimatising the fish in a huge barrell all nine of them were in the tank.

I was still sat watching them at 1 am this morning...unbelievable, how quick theys seemed to settle. Okay so I had done two 60% water changes in the few days previously and turned off the CO2, the NO3 was virtually zero, PH 7.2, KH 4, GH 6, TDS 198, temperature 29 degrees, now tunred down to 28 degrees as Wild Discus prefer the slightly lower temperature to domestic Discus.

I left the Moonlight LED on over night, came down this morning at 07:30 and they were all swimming around beuatifully in a shoal. I sat eating my breakfast watching them. So far so good... now comes the hard part, getting them to feed, and so it begins, another adventure, another experience to share.

I have promised myself that no matter what happens, I WILL NOT get my self to the point where I am obsessed to the point where it is not enjoyable looking after them. More of a ke sera ke sera, whatever will be will be.

Fed them a few tiny pieces of PISCINE Mysis shrimp, some Tetra Prima Granules, and a bit of Freeze Dried Californian Blackworm. They all sniffed at it at first, but I noticed that when one of them starts going for it, its like a wolf pack mentality...and guess what, that was the first sign of them behaving differently, the pecking order for who gets at the food first...slight bust up and a bit of sand got disturbed, but hey nothing to get stressed about right? That is what happens in nature, so if you want nature in your living room, especially with Wild Discus, you have to take the good with the bad.

So far from watching them shoal, the good outweighs the bad, as long as it stays that way I'll be happy.

Some early photos off my phone below, updates to follow.

Thanks,

Steve

Normal LED Tank light on

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Subdued LED Tank light on
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LED going into dusk
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Last edited:
Fantastic update!
so glad you were able to source an established shoal & well worth the drive.

I'm not much for the painted Discus (some of them are brilliant art but just not something I want in my aquarium) but the wilds are amazing.

Really like the look of the Discus with the sand & limited plants.

Hoping for Daily .... OK .... Weekly Updates 🙂




Now don't read the following unless interested in unasked for opinion :lol:

I'd ditch the rainbows - too distracting :crazy:
& you'll likely observe a change in discus behaviour afterwards - even if you don't see any apparent (negative) impact while the rainbows are there 🙂

It's also much easier to feed the tank (especially longterm water quality/filter maintenance) if Discus only - try to choose tankmates with similar or complimentary feeding habits ... perhaps some bottom cleanup crew whether Corydoras or M ramirezi etc or some sort of hatchet fish (I don't recall if tank is covered 😳
(none of the fast darting voracious food gulping tetra crew :lol: )

I'd not add any new fish without 4-6 week quarantine.
 
Thanks Alto,

I am not keen on some of the colour varieties, like marlboro, pinks, bright yellows etc, some videos on Youtube lok like a right box of smarties. Informative and as helpful as ever. You are right there doesn't seem to be any negative effect so far from the Rainbows being present, then again I am not sure what would be a negative effect. Any tips, if it does make that much difference I will probably ditch the rainbows if I can catch them without freaking the discus out.
alto said:
& you'll likely observe a change in discus behaviour afterwards
Click to expand...
What kind of change???

The tank is covered and there are a few corys and ottos in there but probably not enough to call a clean up crew. There are that many M Ramirez species / types I wouldn't know where to start, so many colour varieties. I like the Hatchet Fish, Dave Mercer had a shoal in his tank. They all seem to stay aroung the top, so not exactly a clean up crew.

So anyone interested in a bunch of dwarf neon rainbows? Let me know.

Cheers,

Steve
 
For Rainbow catching (& most fish) I just use a large net (think 25cm "square" very fine, thin mesh - it seems less visible ... or maybe because the frame is more distant ...) & just move very slowly, never chase, just wait for fish to come close - at this point I remain slow with the net, though some people have a very good "flick" mine doesn't seem to work as well 😉
Just be satisfied with however many Rainbows you catch quietly, then return later etc

You can also set up a Fish Trap - just google "fish bottle trap"


Sometimes fish are much easier to catch when tank is only dimly lit - I'd not try "night catching" as this will likely freak the Discus 😱



Discus + rainbows - the discus seem more comfortable & "outgoing" once rainbows are gone - not big changes but more like as expanded range of behaviours; though I've seen some discus change from seemingly shy & retiring to bold as anything within a day of rainbow removal :wideyed:

Htachet fish are more if you (or housemates 😉) want a few more fish in the tank - I quite like the Carnegiella species, they won't really compete with discus over food

M ramirezi - the natural wild type (as pictured) tends to be a stronger fish, you can sometimes find wild caught stock (likely the hardiest IF acclimated properly, also greater need for soft acidic water though)

If you can find locally bred stock, they are usually sound.

Shop fish, you need to really look at their behaviour & ask the shop for details on the fish, avoid any of the "balloon" & "long fin" mutations, if you can source German or Dutch bred they're often stronger fish, some of the farmed fish are fine, some seem extremely sensitive (note that Asian farms also market some of their fish as "German blue" "Holland red" so you cant assume origin without confirmation from shop)
 
Beautiful wilds Steve. I have seen them on Chens Discus and if I ever go down the discus rabbit hole it will be wilds i get.
 
Thanks Lindy, So far so good. They have been feeding quite a lot, which is the only time they get a bit tetchy. Just got to keep an eye on the NO3 and TDS and work out the water change routine.

If you are ever near Chester feel free to pop in and see them for yourself.

But beware, once bitten it stays with you. I bought a huge tank years ago from Oasis Aquarium in Salford and set it up as a Marine tank, Corals, live rock, fish the full hit. Less than 9 months later I went to Germany and saw a massive discus tank. Within a week of getting back home I'd sold all the contents and converted it into a discus tank.

Mad or what...

Steve
 
Well first water change done today, only about 25% to begin with, cleaned all the glass at the same time nice and steady, and no mad panic or darting around from the fish! So all good so far.

I am using a HMA Filter straight from the tap in the kitchen and I usually set the thermostat on the combi boiler to 29 degrees (its a posh boiler) then run the water in at a trickle. But...I am thinking of using a Hydor 300 watt Inline Heater that I have got lying around, and connecting it to the outflow from the HMA Filter and letting it run from there into the tank. The reason I am thinking of doing this is because it does away with pumping warm water from the combi boiler into the HMA Filter, and stops any messing around with the thermostat, and I think there may be more copper from the hot water pipes than there is from the cold.

Just a thought, what do you reckon.

Steve
 
Hi Flygia sad to hear that, I have done the same over the years, it happens to everyone at some stage, but with me it keeps coming back. This will come as a shock, but this time I am determined to keep them, even at the sacrifice of the plants if I have to, so it may evolve into a sandy leafy branchy discus biotope.

But at the moment I an trying to strike a balance so done away with the carpet and foreground plants and stuck with large mid to rear ground plants that can tolerate warmer softer water.

Cheers,

Steve
 
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