What to look for in choosing a discus

[greenmaji]

Rxblade123... have you read this thread?

The discus discussion thread should give you an idea of how to care for discus.
Have you had fish before? Have you had any trouble with the maintainace that is required with the fish you have had in the past? Discus requrie alot more maintanace then most fish. LFS's are not a place to buy discus either.. 90% of the discus I have seen in LFS's look to have Hex.. The LFS doesnt normaly give young discus the care that they need, young discus need daily water changes this just isnt done normaly at LFS's.. BrianNY recomends Great Lakes Discus to get healthy clean discus.

 

[Rxblade123]

I've read/skimmed through the discussion, mostly read, but skimmed through whatever I have read earlier. Green I have had fish for about 3 years or so. And I don't really think I had too much of a problem with maintaince.

 

[greenmaji]

In my opinion if your realy want discus and realy think you can take care of them then I would say that you probably should.. Im realy wonding if BrainNY is going to chime in here some time...

 

[Rxblade123]

Does anybody know a site with many strains of Discus? I went to the LFS earlier and saw 2 Discus about 2-3 inches for 19.99 each. They were a bit yellow colored and had some greyish specks of colors. Is it too young to show it's best colors? The fins looked good and seemed extremely healthy. The thing I was fond of was the colors, but I'm still wondering if I should get it. I want to see if I can raise one and keep it healthy.

 

[greenmaji]

check out the great lakes discus link I put up there.. they have some discus that I had never seen before!

 

[Rxblade123]

I looked through the pics and the closest dicus that looked like the one I saw was the Discus in Gallery 2 that had Gold and Yellow under it except the one in the lfs had some weird spot like markings and was much smaller.
And another question, I think I read something that said Discus could get some dark vertical bars when stressed, but in the pictures there were some Discus with some bars and I think they looked really good with them. Is this stress or is that how the are suppose to be colored?

 

[greenmaji]

what is the name of the discus color your talking about, is it gold diamond, gold melon or gold and yellow? the dark spot could be just a mix colored discus in other words just not a perfect color strain.. Im guessing that your talking about he vertical bars that are on the Leopards, this is there normal coloring and stress bars look a little different.. when you can see the stress bars they are very dark and go verticaly all the way up and down the fishies body that and the color of the fish gets a little darker its something Ive seen in person before, its not hard to spot.. Im sure there are pic's around here on AA of stress bars on discus.. I think Ive seen a few... HTH

 

[mattrox]

Discus with peppering are said to be "pigeon blood". There are many pigeon blood strains. When looking for these often keepers will look for specimens with as little peppering as possible.

In general however, the rounder the better. Look for small eyes in proportion to the body. Larger eyes in proportion to the body can be a sign that the fish's growth is stunted. Make sure that the fish you choose have gill covers that hide all the gills. Some LFS specimens may have gill covers that expose the gills. Not just a problem in discus either, but it can easily be over looked in nicely coloured round fish.

 

[BrianNY]

I can think of several reasons to buy your first discus from an lfs RXblade.

You get to actually observe the fish you're going to buy. You can ask the shop keeper to feed the fish in front of you. Select the fish with the best appetites and appearance. Ask to have te pH tested when you're there. Unless you're buying many fish, you'll pay less in the long run because shipping next day air is very expensive.

I wouldn't worry about stress bars too much. In most cases it's like a mood thing and isn't indicative of health. However a happy discus generally doesn't display the stress bars. I wouldn't buy any fish that's obviously dark, has clamped fins, large eyes, or is thin around the forehead.

 

[greenmaji]

The next day air is $75 for two boxes of discus to your local airport so yes that alone is a consideration to be taken into account..
I have seen some nice looking discus in a few LFS's.. They were almost always Red Turquoise in that area at the time.. It would really depend on your local LFS's as to weather or not the discus are being taken care of and if you saw good looking full bodied discus at a LFS then you might just be in luck.. they might know what there doing.. I had a LFS in OH that the owner was a discus buff.. his looked great! but this has been a rarity in my experience.. hope you have better luck finding them locally then Im having....

btw.. your discus are looking great Brian!

 

[Rxblade123]

I really like those Discus on the left. ( In BrianNY's pic)
Greenmagi the ones I saw in the LFS looked similar to these http://greatlakesdiscus.com/aaa11.jpg I didn't know what kind it was, because it only said Gold and Yellow under it. Is it advisable to buy just one discus? I don't want to buy lots and only have them die.

 

[greenmaji]

"Gold and Yellow" would be the name of the color..LOL
Im not sure about the single discus thing.. I would think it would be ok.. but Im not so sure..

 

[BrianNY]

Truthfully no. One discus is not a great idea as they are really shoal fish and do better in numbers. However 3 or 4 seem to be worse than one. The best numbers for juveniles seem to be 5 or more. So if your wallet is limited, you're better off spending the money on fish rather than air freight. Where are you thinking of housing these discus Rxblade?

 

[Rxblade123]

46 Bow front. Have 2 kribs and 2 angels in it so far.

 

[greenmaji]

Angels are not a good idea with discus.. the angels are more aggesive eaters and your likely going to have to overfeed to get the discus the food that they need.. wich is bad for water quality and what is bad for water quality is bad for discus..

 

[Rxblade123]

IC...

 

[greenmaji]

btw. it is advisable to have a 75 gallon tank for a full shoal of adult discus, 6 fish..

*edit* and a 29 gallon tank to grow them out in, for ease of maintance purposes.. ie. the water changes are smaller on a smaller tank.. *edit*

 

[BrianNY]

Greenmagi is correct. As a somewhat experienced discus keeper even I wouldn't place juvenile discus with any other species. Too many opportunities for things to go wrong.

 

[Rxblade123]

Oh ok. I'll hold off keeping Discus for a few years until I get a bigger tank for just the Discus.

 

[greenmaji]

It just sounds like you need to catch a little multiple tank syndrom.. I think most discus keepers had MTS before they got into keeping discus... ROFL!!! I have 4 tanks right now and I dont think I would turn down a good deal on one any time soon...LOL