If you don't find a local breeder, I know April, who is a sponsor over on simply, gets some top quality discus in and she is in Canada.
Compatibility with Discus
- Thread starter Jaykit
- Start date
yup, the tetras are disposable. It was explained to me this way. If new Discus arrive into a new tank and don't see smaller fish, they assume there must be a predator around. If they see a school of tetras with nary a concern, they figure everything is A-OK. Smaller schooling fish act as a sort of early alarm.
I don't know where you plan on buying your discus, but 150 dollars for a group of eight fish would be nearly impossable, I just spent 200 on one fish. I would expect to pay at least 50 bucks each.
Total dissolved solids.....Discus prefer this number low. You can pick up one one ebay for 29 bucks.
The breeder I have been in contact with is selling some juvies for $25/each and I know of a couple other possibilities within the <$50/each. These may not be the best quality strains or anything but i'm not looking for show quality at this point. Still trying to search down the best source to find my group.
I've also started the progression to increase temperature. I have 4 weeks until I would be able to pick up any group so I am planning on increasing the temperature by 1C/2F each week. I will monitor the currently inhabitants during the week and if weird/bad things begin to happen within the tank I will return to the orginal 25C/77F and wait until a better time to get my group of discus.
Hey Jay,
One way I held down the price is I bought ones he bred himself instead of the imports. You might want to ask if they have local bred for less. I know that mine were under $20 each - I got blue pigeon bloods and brilliant turqs - not the best choice for interbreeding but very pretty, affordable discus. His imports were $40 and up.
Just a thought,
One way I held down the price is I bought ones he bred himself instead of the imports. You might want to ask if they have local bred for less. I know that mine were under $20 each - I got blue pigeon bloods and brilliant turqs - not the best choice for interbreeding but very pretty, affordable discus. His imports were $40 and up.
Just a thought,
Yup, you can keep the price down with Juve's, but then again were back to the Juvie vs planted tank issue.....
A lot of good advice already given here. My two cents......As star_rider stated, juvies can be raised very successfully in a planted tank but only if you really have an understanding of how your tank works and how to keep the tank clean (not everybody has the same definition of clean tank!) with all the frequent feedings, and what you feed and start with healthy discus and meet their needs. One of the big issues people face with juvie discus and planted tanks is that a lot of discus breeders feed raw beef-heart food mixtures as the main food to get the fastest growth. There's always some fat in the beefheart and that fat will not be eaten. Now here's where a big problem would occur.....you feed your juvies beef-heart 5 or 6 times a day in a planted tank with tiny pieces of raw beef-heart fat getting caught in the plants at 86F....you're going to be in water quality trouble in no time. You would have to do a lot of siphoning in a planted tank every day to be sure that this didn't happen. I raised mine in a moderately planted tank, leaving lots of open space for ease of frequent cleanings, used bloodworms and white worms as my protein source rather than beef-heart, and had enough small bottom feeders to help with any leftover food. I also had a complete understanding of how my tank worked. It can be done, it may take a bit longer for them to reach full size but generally discus aren't considered to be fully mature and finished growing until about 2 years of age.
All else aside, my number one recommendation for anyone deciding to buy discus is make sure the discus you buy are healthy! Know the difference between a healthy discus and a not-healthy discus! Otherwise you'll spend months trying to get them healthy and keep them alive.
All else aside, my number one recommendation for anyone deciding to buy discus is make sure the discus you buy are healthy! Know the difference between a healthy discus and a not-healthy discus! Otherwise you'll spend months trying to get them healthy and keep them alive.
Thanks for that. I'll ask around. I'm sure by the time all my questions get answered any breeder/dealer will hate me.
I've been on a few sites already that have pictures comparing what you should be looking for and what is bad/unhealthy. I think that as I go looking around it will become more clear rather than just looking at pictures someone else posted but definetly helps to know what to start looking for. The food aspect was actually my next area of questions. What does everyone feed their discus? I've read some use beef heart and blood worms and other such things but then I've also read to just only use beef heart and flakes because everything else can contain so many diseases within it?
I didn't use beefheart either. The breeder I got mine from used mainly bloodworms so my discus didn't even like beefheart. I used bloodworms, frozen brine shrimp, chopped up earthworms, frozen mysis shrimp and Omega one flake (occasionally) and I had my biggest bull make it to a small dinner plate size. They'll grow and do fine if you feed them well and keep it clean.
Its a great adventure!
