discus questions?

[hillbilly]

"To each his own". Some people even go as far as to send their Discus water to a lab to be analyzed and measured element by element.

 

[fishyjoe26]

i ended up getting rid of my silver dollars and keeping the rest of the fish. i now have bought some bala sharks and im happy with them.

 

[Jfitz]

i would get rid of all the aggressive fish like the angels, even if their acting nice now they wont be acting nice with the discuss because the discus is a chichlid aswell and they tend to fight, or even bully
the bullying can cause the discus to stop eating and eventually die
this happened to my first discus and i was rly pissed, but i also had a rainbow shark (really bad idea because they chase)
if its your first time with a discus try only putting it with little fish like guppies, tetras etc..
its terrible losing a fish like a discus

 

[sledge760]

The results are far from the same. Even with the most minute amount of excess nutrients, the discus will stunt. They absolutely will not grow to the same size as they will in the smaller tanks. 1st reason is going to be the nutrients. 2nd reason is that discus are very skiddish, the larger the space, the more room they have to swim. The more room, the more calories they burn, causing less to be left for growth. This also will cause stunting. 3rd reason, just as ewok mentioned with water changes being less motivated, gravel vacing a large tank will be less motivated, resulting in more rotting food... which equals... stunting. The size tank he has is simply not a good grow out tank.

I am planning on converting my 180 South American tank to Discus at the beginning of next month. So you are saying that my Discus will never grow to full size in a 180? No one that has say, a 150 gallon or larger tank can grow full size Discus even by a following a strict maintenance/feeding routine?

 

[WyldFya]

I am planning on converting my 180 South American tank to Discus at the beginning of next month. So you are saying that my Discus will never grow to full size in a 180? No one that has say, a 150 gallon or larger tank can grow full size Discus even by a following a strict maintenance/feeding routine?

In comparison, a discus raised in a smaller tank, like a 55, will grow a considerable amount larger than a discus grown out in a larger tank, say 150. Even with identical water changes, and identical feedings.

 

[sledge760]

In comparison, a discus raised in a smaller tank, like a 55, will grow a considerable amount larger than a discus grown out in a larger tank, say 150. Even with identical water changes, and identical feedings.

Well that completely reverses the "Your fish will only grow as big as the tank it is in" theory. Does this mean I should not even bother if I cannot grow full size Discus? No one has Discus in a tank over 150-180 gallon?

 

[WyldFya]

Well that completely reverses the "Your fish will only grow as big as the tank it is in" theory. Does this mean I should not even bother if I cannot grow full size Discus? No one has Discus in a tank over 150-180 gallon?

They can be in big tanks, that isn't a problem, but if you are starting with young discus, they won't grow nearly as big. This isn't to say they won't still be nice fish, but they won't be winning any cichlid of the year awards. If you start with adult discus, then you won't have a problem.

 

[Jfitz]

well what about a really small tank like a 30 Gal. Would i be ridiculously big?
and what about the discus that are in the wild... how big do they get?

 

[DigThemLows]

In comparison, a discus raised in a smaller tank, like a 55, will grow a considerable amount larger than a discus grown out in a larger tank, say 150. Even with identical water changes, and identical feedings.

I call complete BS on this one..................How on earth do you think you can back this up?? It's a little easier to keep a 55 clean maybe, but that only means larger amounts of water being changed.

You'll get full size wonderful adults in your 180, just keep the water clean and feed lots of different foods!

 

[DigThemLows]

In fact, Watley says that discus have a chemical that slows growth when they are in smaller tanks........comes from getting trapped in "pools" during the dry season and conserving food/energy by staying smaller. Don't know that it's been proven, but he raises amazing fish that are plenty big...........

and these 7+" fish were raised in a 110 gallon.........