BigBen's Operation Discus

[BigBen]

Another sighting of the BN just now, there is a hint of bristles starting to grow and it has quite a hairy head, so I'm hoping it's a male. Definitely the prettiest I have had. I missed the best shot because the snakeskin decided to photobomb me....

[BigBen]

Some pics from tonight's water change. I've upped the water changes on this tank as weekly just want enough for growing the Discus, although I think genetics might have played a part as some are ok. Lemons and Sterbai are looking good. The big discus commands the flower pot at water change time. Everyone else has to hide somewhere else!

[Lee_k]

Looking good Ben! - How big are the discus getting now?

[BigBen]

Looking good Ben! - How big are the discus getting now?

Biggest is at 5" and another two are going well but the rest of them are stunted - I still enjoy them though. Bad genetics I guess as I feed 4x a day and 4 water changes a week. I think I'm going to get another but from a different supplier, probably Chen's with a quarantine period with another of mine to hopefully prevent the plague.

[Lee_k]

Where did these come from?

5" is about all they actually hit in the wild! its in the tanks where we can see 8.5-9" if you really try to get them there! I guess average for tank fish is 6.5-7"?

[BigBen]

Plymouth Discus, however I wouldn't want to question the quality of his fish overall to be honest as his bigger fish were beauties. On Chen's Facebook page you see some absolute monsters from people who show them. 100% daily water changes and tonnes of food.

Where did these come from?

5" is about all they actually hit in the wild! its in the tanks where we can see 8.5-9" if you really try to get them there! I guess average for tank fish is 6.5-7"?

[BigBen]

Love these fish!

[BigBen]

I haven't really updated this log regarding the discus for a little while. You can see that the Discus are a bit of a mixed bag in terms of how they've grown. I'm doing 4/5 50% water changes a week at the moment as I'm not sure what I was doing was working. The plants are really thriving since I removed the weed that is Silvinia. It was growing to about an inch deep in a week, started driving me mad. Since removing it though I've got a bit of black beard algae in a few places, notably on my Anubias Tree.

It's going to be a bit of a mission to move 125 miles with this tank! Anyway, here's the pictures








I also noticed some egg residue from the Sterbai. Hopefully I'll catch them at it to harvest some. I'd like a group of about 20 in this tank. I've never owned a big group of a single species before.

[BigBen]

Same story with this tank as the Cory tank, not going to do much until we've moved. I have a few issues with Algae in the discus tank:




I suspect the issue is low flow in the right hand side of the tank, I've tried to adjust the flow heads but the issue is cropping up a bit more in the middle of the tank. I intend for this tank to be less planted once we move and far more open, so this will go away but it's annoying. I'll probably chuck an air stone in the corner to see if it helps, but from past experiences I've kind have admitted defeat with the plants that are covered.


Now to start planning to move the fish 125 miles with a night in bags, fun....

[plankton]

Good luck.