discus question -- softened hard water?

[coolchinchilla]

Discus...

I'd love to set up a tank of discus at some point. And I have questions about water that I can't seem to find answers to. I'd be a hobbyist with maybe a 90+ gallon planted tank with a 36-gal grow-out tank. I'd start with the recommended 6 juvies and I'd like to breed them. I want to get some of those really cool super red melon fish. They'd be expensive and have to be shipped. I'm just wondering if this is a pointless dream because my tap water is so far afield from what discus are usually kept in. My tap water is very hard ( 28 ) and very basic (8.4+). I don't know what other components it has in it.

Generally, discus are from slightly acidic water ( 6.8 ) that is very soft. I go to discus websites (www.simplydiscus.com) and read that discus can live and breed happily in any sort of tap water you may have (less the chlorine). "A good rule of thumb: If you can drink your tap water your fish will be fine in it. " Other sites suggest that you try to achieve the soft acidic water by RO/DI or PH chemicals or by peat or substrate or something else.

What is true? Tap water or highly modified water?

Ok... going with the "any water is fine" idea, what I'm unsure of is what about my very hard water ( 28 ) that is softened. I have a standard water softener that softens both my hot and cold tap water. A water softener doesn't purify water. It simply exchanges the calcium and magnesium for sodium. Therefore the number of disolved things in the water is the same so is it effectively the same "hardness" for the fish?. Is that ok? Maybe sodium ions are too rough on Discus?

Also can I really do ok with very basic water? If the fish were raised in 6.8-7.4 water can I really move 'em to 8.4? Would I be able to aclimate them successfully?

I have tried to keep neon tetras which are also soft acidic water fish. They keep dying on me in a community aquarium with good parameters (0/0/20). The best explanation I have is my water parameters are wrong for them. My reasoning is if I can't keep neons, I would never be able to keep discus.

Ok, so say I get an RO/DI. Would it get exhausted really quickly because of the hardness? 8O

Can someone give me hope for my dream of a discus tank?

Thanks in advance.
coolchinchilla

 

[greenmaji]

First I would PM BrianNY... he has the most water is ok philosophy as long as your fish are properly acclimated and the water is what he calls paltiable(sp?)(or something to the effect of very very clean)
the drip method is advised to acclimate.. this would acclimate to right about any water peramithers.. but of course.. I havent talked to him about extremely hard water wich is your case.. mine is only relatively hard....
Did you use the drip method to acclimate the neons? If you didnt then I would advise you give them another try and acclimate them using the drip method.. your right in assuming that if you cant keep neons alive then you will have trouble keeping discus..
I personally dont like the idea of having a water softener(I am very aware of what they do, I lived in a area were well water and water softeners were the norm) and I would worry about the salinity of my tap water in that case 8O
I think that you could use a RO/DI unit without much concern about it getting exausted.. they are relatively cheap on e-bay.. I can give a link to the best e-bay store I have found so far.. I keep in in my favorite sellers in case I ever decide to get one (wich I might once I start keeping discus, the soft water is need for the eggs to be fertilized)
chemical treatment of your water would be a horrible idea.. one the chemicals dont get rid of the problem.. they only add to it.. the actual minerals that are causing the hardness are still there and acid is added to bring down the PH.. total dissolved solids or minerals are the problem and this is no way to solve it in my opinion..
your post was kind of long.. but if I missed anything then just ask.. HTH
best e-bay RO/DI store that I have found thus far...
The Aqua-Safe Pure Water Shop E-bay Store

 

[macman7010]

Hello coolchinchilla,

Since this is the first time Ive replied to one of your posts I will say "welcome." Any website that says that Discus can be kept in and breed in happily in "any sort of tap water" is just plain wrong. No fish on Earth can live and breed in "any sort of tap water." Any water that will contain a fish needs to be conditioned to some extent to make it acceptable to support aquatic life. Then to say that if you can drink your water you can keep fish in it, well that is just plain ludicrous. It is even more ludicrous that they are saying these things about keeping Discus fish. That just goes to show you how screwed up the internet can get you with un-edited information.

Anyhow your hard tap water would not work very well as raising discus with a ph of 8.4. The neon tetras you kept may have died from the hardness of your water, though neons are known to be one of the harder to keep of the tetra family. With the water parameters you gave me an African Cichlid tank would thrive at your house considering the water coming from your tap is what I like to call - Liquid Rock. Luckily though you are not out of the loop at keeping Discus, many people have kept and bred Discus in a variety of water conditions, though yours would prove to be a bit of a risk.

First dont think because your neons died that Discus would. Discus are in my opinion much hardier than any member of the tetra family, and I keep rummynose tetras with my discus to be the kind of Canary in the Coal mine, they normally will lose the vibrant red of thier noses if the water quality is below the needed limit. Getting an RO unit would improve the softness of your water and remove all the minerals causing for the hardness. It would likely wear down quickly because of your hardness and might prove an expensive and less than ideal solution.

You could always try making a 50/50 mix of your water and some RO water from a local store. The wal mart near my house sells culligan RO and UV water that has a ph of 6.5 . I found with my girl friend's tank, she has the same liquid rock as you, that a 50 50 mix of the two waters resulted in a ph of 7.0-7.1 and a much lower hardness value. If you want softer go with more RO water, harder more of your water. This would get expensive in the case of discus keeping since regular water changes are needed, but i am sure some kind of routine system could be implemented.

Lowering the ph chemically is risky and the only thing I would do to soften the water is either an RO unit or water mixture like I mentioned. You could slowly start putting less of the RO water in the tank during water changes and try to acclimate the discus to your water ph and hardness. Doing this slowly such as starting out with a ph of 6.8 with the mixture than over the course of several weeks raising it up to your tap water's natural value could work.

 

[BrianNY]

While I agree that there's a huge difference between neons and discus, I'm not so sure I agree that discus can't be kept comfortably in what you call liquid rock macman. Here's why. Much of the info that we have on discus is a throwback to the time when one could only get wild caught fish. There was a concerted effort to duplicate as close as possible the water these wild caught fish had come from or the fish would waste away and die. Likewise, most of the small tetras (such as neons or cardinals), are wild caught fish. We are now so many generations away from wild caught discus.

The pH and hardness of my water is artificially high because I use crushed coral to stabilize the pH. As long as I'm not breeding these fish I really don't care what the pH or hardness is. If I were you coolchinchilla, I would email the prospective seller and ask what his water is like, and then describe yours. Get many opinions before you reach a conclusion.

 

[macman7010]

Sounds good brian. I am lucky to have tap water ph at 6.8 with low conductivity and no nitrates or nitrites. I live on a property that has a spring fed from a stream that feeds the lake nearby where I live. This lake is actually rated by the DNR to be the best natural waters for fish and organic life in the state - so I lucked out on that one.

One reason it would worry me is because my girl friend has a ph of 8.4 from her tap, and she originally wanted to keep a discus pair. The breeder lived nearby to her house and was keeping his fish at a ph of 7.2 with excellent breeding results. She went through 3 pairs of juveniles before we finally gave up. I have never seen Discus turn so quickly in my life. Stress bars out, cloudy eyes, gone within a several day period.

She now keeps a variety of other fish in that tank, mainly easier keepers like Kribensis, Brichardi and some fancy dwarf plecos. I dont know if the water ph was the culprit or the fish but I know that particular breeder supplies many fish shops with Discus and from what I am told they do well.

Although I am friends with an African Cichlid breeder that keeps discus at an 8.5+ ph so its anyone's guess really.

 

[greenmaji]

I would assume acclimation to be the problem..
The drip method is explained at this site.. below the floating method..
http://www.liveaquaria.com/general/general.cfm?general_pagesid=19

The discussion of RO Im going to reserve for prepping the discus for spawning..
It would be cheaper to purchase a RO/DI unit then to buy the water at a store.. RO water is about $1 a gallon.. A complete RO/DI 100 gallon per day unit with a 4.4gallon pressurized holding tank and 16oz refillable color changing DI resin container runs $147.50 buy it now price with the shipping and handling. The membrane is backflushable and have a 5 year life expectancy with a 200ppm of hardness.. so with your hardness of 483ppm would shorten that life to 2 years (the replacement RO membranes are $35 free shipping from the same site) so this route would be much cheaper then buying the water per the gallon at a store (they make there money from filtering the same water you have with one of these units, the culligain station does anyway..LOL)

 

[macman7010]

I have never used an RO unit personally. I know my girl friend was paying about 50 cents per gallon for RO water from culligan. Since she had a 20 gallon tank and only needed about 10 gallons a week it wasnt a great expense.

Believe it or not we used the drip acclimation over a 4 hour period for her fish. I also keep a saltwater reef tank and I wont use anything but the drip acclimation for corals, fish and inverts in the saltwater setting, and I have applied the same princaple to my freshwater fish keeping.

Another option is the tap water filter from aquarium pharmaceuticals - they are on sale for 21 dollars at that fish place but the filter is 17 bucks a replacement, and I dont know how long it lasts. After hearing from brian it sounds like she might be ok with the water she has.

 

[coolchinchilla]

Thanks everyone for your responses!!!

As you can see, opinions & experiences vary widely. <sigh>

Greenmagi: I'm familiar with the drip method of aclimation. The LFS said I didn't need to do that for my neons. (Shows how much they know.) Your & macman's idea for using a 50-50 RO water seems like a fair option. I can see that chemical manipulation of the water PH is out. Good. That seems much too hard to keep doing. RO water in your area costs $1/gal in stores? Wow. Around here it's $.25/gal. But to have to get RO water from the store is much too time consuming.

Macman: Thank you for the welcome. You lucky dog, your tap water is better than what I can ever hope to get when I filter it (brita pitcher). I can't imagine tap water ever being that pure. Your gf's experience with discus & hard water is what I fear -- and I'm wanting to get fish shipped to me so very expensive. To learn that discus are heartier than neons is reassuring.

BrianNY: I guess it's true that generations of discus raised in different waters would make a difference in being able to survive. That is encouraging. If I use myself, if I have to live in an extremely hot area, my body would adjust some and behaviorally I'd learn coping strategies. Maybe discus in part are like that.

I've heard about the tapwater filter from Aquarium Pharmaceuticals. The filters get used up very quickly with hard water, so that option is a no-go. I guess I need to decide if I can get by without an RO/DI filter and that's the balance of the question for me, my water, and my dream of a discus tank. Maybe I can use RO water and then acclimate the fish over a few months. If it is ~$150 and the membranes last at least 2 years, that may be the way to go.

The expenses keep piling up for this dream tank... $250+ for tank, $100 for accessories, $150 for RO/DI, $200 for fish and I'm probably way under estimating. ah... well. This is in the future for me. I'd much rather spend $1000 for a cool fish tank than replace the floor or buy a new living room set.

Thanks for the affirmation. I will definitely plan a discus tank as I acquire funds for it.

coolchinchilla

 

[greenmaji]

I was refering to using RO water for spawning purposes only.. if acclimated correctly, the drip method in most cases, plenty of water changes is all youll need to keep discus..

Getting the eggs to fertilize is were the RO water will come in and youll need to test for TDS for that and I would suggest getting it down to 150-200.. your likely up around 500-600 or worse with your tapwater making 50/50 not suffecent for that task. the RO/DI filters I gave the links for come with a TDS meter to help you find the right mix when the time comes.

 

[coolchinchilla]

Greenmaji: Oh... Ok... Maybe the RO water can wait then.

Thanks.
coolchinchilla