An amazing Discus experience

Hi guys.

During the past week I have been witness to an amazing development with my Discus. Due to me revamping the fishroom, awaiting tanks and stands, and the young discus occupying most available tanks, I have had to put all my adults into the largest, a 460lit deep tank. This includes 3 pairs that have all raised fry previously, bringing the total to 10 fish. Last week monday pair 1 spawned on the powerhead attached to a sponge filter. Being ONLY tap water, I thought nothing of it. On wednesday night I had a visit from @Slojo, and whilst we were discussing things, pair 2 spawned on the glass, approx. 15cm away from pair 1. Again, I was not expecting anything. Yet, by miracle pair 1's eggs hatched on Thursday. Not many, I'd guess about 10. On friday I noticed that all fry were gone, and when I looked at the eggs of pair 2, I noticed that their eggs have turned dark, as fertile eggs do, BUT. . .that fry, from pair 1 were now dangling on top of these unhatched eggs. Did they "steal" them? On saturday morning I woke and found pair 2's eggs hatched, and the fry total had now reached almost 20. THEN. . .on Sunday night pair 3 spawned at the other end of the tank. This is the same Snakeskin pair who's fry are now at 11 weeks. Monday afternoon resulted in expected disappointment with pair 2's fry being missing.
Today, upon feeding of these, I noticed a most astonishing thing! The female of pair 3 which last laid eggs, had 2 fry grazing from her side, 5 wrigglers still dangling on a mass of abt 200 still to hatch eggs!

Is it now possible that the female has at present fry from 3 spawns with her, either "stolen" or picked off as the circulation in the tank had washed them about. It would only be possible to know if the fry survive, which is impossible in this set up.

Still makes for an amazing observation and experience!

Rgds

Marco

 

i THINK its time to declare you discus guru

 

Wheres the "Like" button?
Awesome story.

 

Stop the boat here.......

Take the first 2 pairs out and let the 3rd pair continue raising!

 

@hein24 - lets not get ahead of ouselves here! Still a lot to learn.

@Zoom
Wont work bud, the tank is just too big, the fry will just go missing. Pity though. . .

 

Nah I have seen this before

I would be dead carious to see which fry survived and ended up where.
Must be nice to know your discus will spawn anywhere.

 

@Vis

Just. . .luck!

 

That's awesome! I have experienced this with other cichlids in the past. The parents would steal other spawns if they were in the same tank. My Apistogramma sp Steel Blue did it, as well as my pair of Bolivian Rams. So this behavior is not uncommon to cichlids in general. But it's an awesome story! Now where are the pics?

 

@slagter
Sorry. . .No pics.
Sadly, .all fry now gone. All that remain is the eggs from pair 3 which should hatch within a day or so.

We should try apply that those Apisto's have a name change- we'll call them 'Apistogramma Steel Fry'. . . Now then they'll fit right in with the new SA. . .

 

I SEE you BABY...Shakin That A$$ !!

STEAL?? Word is too strong for refined fish such as Discus..
Appropriated..more like it!
OR How about Creative Persuasive Fostering?

That IS a nice enough experience , 3 spawns, 1 week, 1 temporary tank
...and TAPWATER
...in Gauteng!?:blink1:

I see you, and RAISE you...hehe
A few years back at my current facility, added 8 Adult Discus to a 1.2m
Formed 4pairs in "JUST 240L"
When First Pair Spawned, and then within a week or so EACH subsequent pair would as well.
Pairs fought for attention of neighbouring spawns recently hatched.
A few casualties aside, it was CRAZY watching proto-fish move through fry-friendly barriers and flit foster parent to foster parent...and MAYBE even onto it's OWN PARENTS' sides during the stupendous
"SPAWN-O-RAMA"

Ride with it Marco ..'Cos Date night, is EVERY other night...when the MOJO is strong

 

Hi Guys,

Quick update

All 'stolen' , or as @Altum put, "appropriated" fry now gone.
However, pair 1 spawned AGAIN on Monday night, eggs hatched this very morning. AND. . .pair 3 has about 40 wrigglers which should be free swimming by tonight.

Male from pair 3 is a real Pitt-bull, and being the largest fish in the tank also helps. All other fish are only allowed 1/2 of the tank, whilst he stands "Gatekeeper" and allow NO visitors to his new born.

I have had amazing fish experiences, but this is up there with the best. A window into 'wild' behaviour. I feel TRULY blessed!

Rgds

Marco

 

Hi Guys

So the very same thing has been happening AGAIN! Only this time I had a camera ready, and so, here follow a short trip down "Discus Lane"

This pair spawned on the flower pot, they looked after the eggs and as can be seen there are some wrigglers on the pot in this photo.


To their right, about 15cm away, on another upturned flower pot, pair two had spawned also.


Eggs can be seen midway up the pot.

To the far left of the tank, on the return pipe for the powerhead, pair three spawned a giant spawn!
This here is the female guarding the eggs

The following pics just show the proximity of each pair to the other. Excuse the quality.

In the days that followed the most incredible things happened that gave me some insight as to how Discus possibly breed in the Wild. When the eggs started hatching and the fry started swimming around, parent fish would steal fry from each other as the fry ate from them. As soon as a Mother took the fry from the dad, the dad would simple swim up to the side of another fish, steal a couple of fry and take them back to his side of the tank. Of course within a day all fry were missing, but I now believe that in the Wild no clear barrier exist as to who's fry gets raised by whom? I believe it to be quite possible that some pairs hardly ever manage to raise fry with other pairs simple stealing their fry. I dont think its a concious "theft" going on, more just mistaken identity as to who's fry is where.
I have two spawns in the same tank at the moment but will unfortunately be removing one to raise artificially in my first attempt at being completely parasite free.

Hope you enjoyed!

Regards

Marco

 

Fascinating stuff man, thanks for gettting us so close to the action
Good luck with the parasite free fish, I feel this is a very important development for SA discus keeping/breeding. I know it's been done in Germany and possibly Israel but not sure if its done anywhere else. Hard work ahead Marco

 

Wow this is just fantastic... Thanks @Marco for sharing this insight on discus breeding with us, I am addicted to this thread.:tongue:

 

@jedigenie
Thanks bud, and yes, hard work and little sleep ahead. Still researching correct method's for this parasite free thing, even on that there is some divided opinions. Have abandoned the present spawn and will leave it with the parents. Had complete water prep failure (my fault). Accidently dropped a used airstone in the water which means its now "exposed". Silly hey!

@hein24
Thank you for taking an interest and I'm glad you are enjoying it. You must come around some time if you in Pretoria and we can start converting you. . .

@Reedfish
Does it? Dont know about that, and dont get the wrong idea, this here is a "new" reality for me even, its not usually this easy to get the buggers to spawn and take care of it. I do think that to have "Tough" Discus, you need a great many other things in place, then yes, they do seem tough. It can however very quickly go of the rocker and then they dont seem so tough anymore. . .


Regards

Marco

 

Haha @Marco I might just take you up on that offer as I am planning to visit petstop soon.

 

@Marco, very nice discus you got and congrats on the spawns,

Still trying to get mine through quarantine, every day has a a fun suprise. But well worth it.

 

Hi Marco,

Just a quick comment over lunchtime.

In nature this sharing of young would never occur because pairs will pair off and then move into the flooded areas in which the trees are standing. There they would lay eggs and hatch their young and raise them completely in isolation. So this is an entirely tank created situation and is not what would happen in nature. My comments are based on observations in nature and not just a thumb suck, I want to add this so that there is no misunderstanding here.

Kind regards,

Dirk