125 Gallon Community Discus Journal and Questions.

[coffeetwitch]

first off its been awhile since i was last on this site. so hello to all the old people i used to talk to.

this tank used to be one of our saltwater tanks that has again been re-purposed. had it running with water for a short bit and came home to a leak. im assuming it was around the bottom seal so i was lucky that i caught it when it was just dripping. any way, i resealed it with black silicone to update the look of the tank. i used aquarium safe silicone and let it cure for 48 hours then filled it with water and its been holding ever since.

filters that i have on it now are 2 marineland emperor 400 pros. im running eheim bio in the plastic media baskets and plan on putting some sort of foam or sponge filter in place of the bonded carbon pads they came with. i also have one fluval 405 filled with fluval bio media only. they are all currently fully cycled

lighting is 156 watts of t5 ho by way of two glo 36" fixtures. bulbs are 4 ati coral plus bulbs currently on a 10 hour on cycle.

i am upgrading from fluval m heaters to 2 eheim 300w heaters that i am going to use as soon as i pick them up from the post office.

background is painted with black enamel that went on better with a regular brush vs the foam.

substrate is caribsea black sand.

currently there are silk plants only in the tank but i may want to add real later on.

drift wood will be limited and kept to only the right most quarter of the tank. none has been purchased yet. i havent fount the right look or pieces for the right price yet.

we have two 40g breeder saltwater tanks and i plan on doing water changes with the rodi unit that we have for them. in fact, i hope to become part of the group buy carey has organized again for bulk reef supply. i need to upgrade my unit. i was looking at the plus or build my own model.

i think thats about it on hardware.

stocking will be
german blue rams (5 currently in the tank)
appistos (2 currently in the tank)
bleeding heart tetras (6 currently in the tank)
albino long fin bushynose? plecos (2 currently in the tank)
cardinal tetras
cory cats? ( dont know how many)

5-6 discus, trying to save up for 4" discus from hans discus
currently these are the ones we are looking at:
*brilliant turquoises
*red scribbelt
*blue diamond
*marlboro red
*fire red
*flachen x snake skin

i was talking to a couple different guys at the lfs that suggested a varied diet of blood worms, brine shrimp. tetracolor tropical granules, and one more that i cant remember at the moment. i dont know if it was beef heart or not.

i am prepared to do weekly 40 gallon water changes.

i know that black background on black substrate (and many will say substrate is unwanted) for discus is considered taboo. i also know that pigeons will pepper in this tank. i know that some will say 40 gallons/week water change is not enough.

im not looking to get into flame wars or be spoken down to for what i have planed. what i am looking for is guidance, earnest advice, and tolerance of our personal taste.

ok, now with all that said...

do i need special substrate for plants or will the sand work? what plants are wise choices for a discus tank? i do like the look of moss on the driftwood, how do i do that? these are what ifs at this point.

temp will probably be kept at 84*F is this acceptable?

any other input would be great.

thanks in advance.

 

[coffeetwitch]

ok so i just got back from picking up the heaters from the post office. it will be nice to get them up and running, still waiting on approval for the group buy and i can upgrade the rodi.

 

[tropical-fish]

Sounds like a good setup. Can't wait to see some photos.

I've got a 75 gal discus tank with black background and black sand. It does make the discus very dark. My blue diamond lost all its color and pigeon got very badly peppered. But my yellow, and blue turk both look good with the dark coloring. You could consider different types of albino discus if they are available.

I would avoid the beef hart or other messy food as it will give you water quality probs in a planted tank.

a weekly 50% water change is what I'm doing, but mine is a smaller tank.

Good luck and keep us posted

 

[coffeetwitch]

thank you for the heads up on the blue diamond. im not married to that fish yet. i just thought the blue would look nice. the german blue rams look amazing in a black on black set up so thats why i thought the blue diamond would.

i have seen some pictures via google with discus in a black tank and , it may be a personal taste, i think they look amazing. i will keep my eyes open for an albino discus. if i cant find one i can double up on a brilliant turquoise or the scribbelt?

again thank you for the reply.

 

[coffeetwitch]

here is a full tank shot. some rocks need to be added and i may put more silk plants in unless i can learn more about live plants and how to care for them.

 

[tropical-fish]

nice size tank with plenty of filtration. it will look even better once the rocks and driftwood are added. i just picked up a great piece of driftwood and gave my tank a make-over yesterday. i'll have to take some photos once the water clears.

sounds like you've done plenty of homework and will have no problem keeping your discus healthy.

in regard to the cories. sterbai's seem to be the best in the high temperatures and they look great against the black sand.

live plants, it's not an area i have much experience in but here's my 2 cents worth anyway haha ..... i had no luck with java moss, it doesn't seem to take well to the temperature required by discus. i've had some good results with wisteria (hygrophila difformis) and amazon swords. you could always try floating plants, riccia may be an option there.

 

[coffeetwitch]

about the plants, ive done some looking about substrate and plants. and only a few said anything about not using florite or something like that. i really dont want to have to have to disrupt the fish i have in there to change it up. of those that said they used sand only, they had to be careful with plant selection because of root structure. do the hygrophila difformis and amazon swords require much to grow? ill do some looking on the suggestions. thank you.

also it looks bright in the picture but its not that bad. camera phones never really did aquariums much justice. the eheim heaters are huge as you can see and anyone with them know. they steadily raised the temp in the tank through out the day. im now holding at the 84* that the fluvals couldnt get close to. they where a 300w and a 200w turned all the way up just to hold at 79-80*

thanks again

 

[coffeetwitch]

still reading through some of the web searches about planting a tank. i think to do this tank right for planting, i would have to pull out my substrate lay down some actual flourite and then put my sand back on top. i keep seeing that most sites recommend 3-4 inches of depth. once i do that, my only restriction would be the lighting. same problem i had with my saltwater tank.

ill have to talk it over with the boss and see what she wants me to do

 

[tropical-fish]

yeah i know what you mean about the camera phones.

the wisteria and amazon swords didn't require much effort on my part. i put some root tabs under them and dosed with seachem flourish once a week with my water change. my substrate is dennerle diamond black.

i would try with the substrate as it is first and see how things go. if it doesn't work out you could give the fluorite idea a shot OR throw in a load of branches like this guy did 3deez's Tank: wild discus biotope

cheers

 

[coffeetwitch]

how deep is your substrate? mine is maybe half an inch give or take. i read that swords gather most of their nutrients from their roots so wouldnt i need to make my sand bed deeper?

that was a nice looking tank. i dont think i would do that much driftwood. im thinking that i want to keep what ever i put in the tank to be tasteful accents.

a bit on livestock. ive been watching the bleeding heart tetras feed, they are fast and obnoxious compared to the rams and the appistos. they will dart through the tank and cram as much as they can in their mouths. isnt this the opposite of what i would want in a discus tank? from my readings they where supposed to be good tank mates.

 

[tropical-fish]

my substrate is about 1 inch at the front, about 2 inches at the back. you are correct about swords feeding mostly through the roots. a deeper substrate may help there.

i have black neon tetras in my discus tank. they are quite fast when it comes to feeding but they are not directly competing for food since the discus pellets are too big to fit into the tetra's small mouth. my discus don't seem to be bothered by them and the neons are very peaceful stay out of the discus's way. but i think i would try cardinal tetras the next time, they look amazing in a black tank.

 

[coffeetwitch]

thanks again for the help and and info

 

[Hondatek]

Check out omega one cichlid flakes . My discus love them. I feed that as a staple diet along with frozen foods of all types.

 

[coffeetwitch]

thanks mike. i have some of that that i alternate with the tetracolor granules to feed the rams.


sorry to hear that you are still having problems with your tank. i hope pork chop and the others make it.

BIG set back that caused this tank to go back to freshwater was that my little fuzzy lion thought he could fly. i really liked him. no where did i read that they where jumpers. anyway after that loss i was done with the idea of a big salt tank.

 

[Hondatek]

No problem. Good luck with the discus . I had no clue lions could jump . I'll have to put a lid on my qt then .

 

[paytertot]

I have a planted tank and I don't have any special substrate. The minerals in those will eventually run out anyways, and you'll just have really expensive sand. I say just get normal sand and use root tabs and liquid or dry ferts. Totally easy. I recommend aponogeton crispus for your tank. I have it in mine and it grows like mad.

 

[coffeetwitch]

thanks, ill look them up.

 

[coffeetwitch]

i like those, i just did some rock work in the tank and i think they would fit in well, thanks again for the tip.

 

[paytertot]

No problem

 

[coffeetwitch]

update:

since the start of the tank ive had some drawbacks. ive lost most of my live stock to a tank bully.

we tried using "java wood" as a piece of driftwood. thats a no go! algae outbreak and mini cycle. thing was slimy and never wanted to sink. i found some internet posts of peole using with success. my story is not the same. after 2-3 weeks of only seeing green and slime i pulled it out and did a massive water change. 3 days of lights out and its been good to go.

while the gbr looked amazing, i did think that the majority of the other fish looked blacked out. because of that i used a 1/2id hose to siphon all the black sand out. easiest way to do it that ive found. way better than draining the tank and using a clean dust pan. i did some google image searches and found that some people have used white silica pool filter sand. looks neat and sweetie pie liked it. i did not. found some tan pool filter sand images and i liked that. we talked and the 6$/ 50lb bag won out. luckily for me it was the tan stuff. quikrete brand pool filter sand is what i used. i wish i used this stuff instead of the play sand that i had in my cichlid tank.

i found an article that i found to be interesting so im going to try it. Deep Sand Beds



all that said i stopped off at my lfs and got my first real water plants

1 little thing of micro swords
1 amazon sword
1 thing that i forgot the name of and the guy helping me didnt write on the bag. oh well.

i also picked up a small bottle of "flourish comprehensive supplement for the planted aquarium" they didnt have any root tabs. if its the wrong stuff, please let me know.