My discus setup

Here is a full explanation of my Discus fish tank setup.



Photo 1 is my 110 liter tank. Had a built in filter on the side with a T5 light. This was my tank when I just bought the discus fish. I had them in this tank for about a year.




Then I bought a bigger tank. 540 liter with 100 liter sump filter. The pump does 2900l/h. I've installed 5 x T8 lights. It's one blue, one red, two day light, and one plant growth tube. I've added a loose water pump in the inside that streams upwards to break the watersurface.


I do 60% water change every second week. Tap the water out of my tank with a garden hose and then just refill it again with hose straight from the garden tap. I do not added any prime or or anti chlorine.


I add the following Seachem products for plant growth, Flourish, Excel, Nitrogen, Phosphorus, Potassium, Iron and Trace once every week, and the tablets every third month.


Photo 2This photo was the tank when I just bought it




My tank moving all my plants and fish from my old tank to the new tank. This tank was just water straight from the garden tap with no prime or anti chlorine in. I've cleaned out the sump filter completely and added new cotton and add more filter rings to the existing filter medium. Didn't add any bacteria.

Photo 3 My tank 4 months later



Photo 4My tank at the moment 8 months later

 

Some picture only came through as attached picture and not in the post.
Here is pictures of my Discus fish

 

Here is the discus that stop growing after if fed them frozen food. He always looked stressed out and under fed

 

I see the photo of my tank moving it over from old to new tank didn't attached but here it is

if the photo is not here then didn't want to attach it

 

Wow... I must say your tank looks stunning! I'm not sure if I followed the timeline correctly, but did you add the discus to the tank when it was already well established with plants?

I think you've created a stunning tank.. You should have entered it in the creative aquascape competition held recently.. I reckon you would have had some prizes arriving at your door. Well done!

 

stunning scape

 

I have to agree with what the others are saying - your tanks do look good!In the past i used to do water changes the same way you describe it,straight from the tap into the tank and i also never lost a single fish.Nowadays i'm using prime and leave it in a bucket for 48 hours,just feel it's safer as i don't like taking chances with my fish.

 

Thank you for all the compliments.

i struggled to load up all my pictures at once for some reason but on my first post the four attached pictures the first picture was my old tank the second picture was the new tank I bought second hand with fish in already, the third photo was my tank after 4 months and the fourth picture after 8 months.

On the second and third post is pictures of my discus fish.

Fourth post was my tank just after I moved it from the old tank to the new tank.

i did a complete water change on the new tank and placed my discus in a few after hours after i were finish with the lay out.

Preparing my water before the time I need to store almost 300liter water before I can add it to my tank. Rather want to spend the money on selnoide's and water purifier to automate the water changing system at a later stage.

i will post a picture of my sump filter as well.

thank you once again.

 

Nice tank

 

Straight from the garden tap

 

Stunning aquascape

 

Great looking tank mate but, I have to agree with @Reedfish here. Adding tap water strait from the tap is not the greatest idea. Please get some prime you will see a major difference.

What tempreture is this tank?

 

Hi Tetra. Very nice tank.... Just goes to show, less is more sometimes!!! Keeping it simple and still have a amazing tank!!

 

Hey Bro,

Stunning. I like it.

 

Hi nice tank but everything in it is wrong for discus.your discus were horibly stunted for a very long time and they did not stop growing from frozen food but rather from bad husbandry.Those size fish you started with would require at least 80% water change daily and fed 4-6 times a day with a syphon after.please do proper research before ever trying to get more discus and if you do dnt put them with these ones as they look sick and wanting to die.Sorry for comming of harsh but im tired of people thinking its ok to keep discus like this and then still showing off your discus and thinking they look ok or good.And you need to add safe or prime as it has more functions than just removing chlorine and chlorimine

 

I`m sorry Quakeszn, but I find your reply rather distasteful and entirely not in the spirit of what I a sure this forum was intended to achieve There are better ways of identifying problems and offering advice to people.

 

[FONT=Verdana, Arial, Tahoma, Calibri, Geneva, sans-serif]Thanks for the comment scubabravo. It just happens that people criticize easier then giving a compliment. There way of fish keeping is usually the only way and doesn't except anybody else's way of doing things. You take up what they post make your own conclusion take note that make sense and laugh off the rest.

I know that changing water straight from the tap isn't the correct way but it's been working for me the last 29 years and the 3 years I've had Discus. If I start to prime my water for a water change I should get better results but doing a 50% water change I will need to prime 270 liter water each time and as Quakeszn states doing a 80% water change daily I will need to prime more than 400 liters a day, maybe one day when I'm retired and have the time and get water free from the munisipality I can do 80% WC daily.

The one discus that is in that terrible state has been like that for a year and a half now. I've fed them frozen bloodworms once and since then the one kept on growing and the other one stopped I've tried to feed them live food to try to get him to eat but he grabs one or two pieces and then just continuous to swim around. I've found a threat once that explained the cause of discus eating frozen food, I will try to find it again and post it.

The 2 red Discus I've bought the weekend in JHB, on my way back from JHB I had to pick up people at the train station where the train was 4 hours late so they've spend half there day in a plastic bag. In a week or 2 they should be settled in again.

I'll take some pictures of the fish the weekend with a camera and post them rather then posting pictures taken from the ipad. Maybe that makes a diffrence.

Thank you for all the compliments and advice that helps to build up a great tank. That's why fish keeping is a hobby and not a race.

I see my tank is 24 degrees at the moment but is usely around 26-27. These few colder days made it to drop. Time to up the heaters again. winters coming[/FONT][FONT=Verdana, Arial, Tahoma, Calibri, Geneva, sans-serif]
[/FONT]

 

I've seen @Tetra 's tank first hand with my own eyes and it's the picture of health. Plants look fantastic and so do the fish! A really fantastic tank! Keep up the good work :adore: