1) Please Introduce your self and tell us what your experience is with fishkeeping, give us as much information as possible as to how long in the hobby, what you have kept in the past and what you currently are working with.
My name is Barry. I've had aquariums since I was a child; but 4 years ago got back into the hobby with a lot more time, money and energy for it. A friend and I competed in an aqua scaping contest at Aquashella last year and won first place. So, I greatly enjoy the aquatic plant side of aquarium keeping. But my greatest passion in the hobby still remains with fish keeping. My latest years I have been keeping angelfish. There has been challenges which I have learned from. I was overstocked and learned quickly the disaster of doing so from aggression issues to bacteria outbreaks to mated pairs, i understand the need for QT and know how to set one up, etc.. I have a circle of friends who are hobbyists as well. We spend a lot of time discussing aquariums, sharing information, going to aquatic seminars, participating in the local aquarium community. I belong to a local plant club where we have regular meetings. I am pretty much on a first name basis with most of the LFS.
2) If you have no previous experience with keeping discus, have you done any research to properly prepare yourself, e.g. have you read any Stickies in this section of SimplyDiscus, or other material?
I have no previous experience keeping discus. I have spent hours watching videos, reading/engaging people on FB in "All About Discus" group, and have been reading threads on this website. I am very comfortable with water chemistry and somewhat familiar with fish diseases. I have a good basic understanding of the ideal way to start a discus tank for beginners. I am fascinated by the fish.
3) Describe your tank, its size and dimensions, breeding or display. Include how long it has been setup or if it is still being cycled.
I have a 90 gal display. Its been running for 3 years. Its cycled.
4) Describe the décor for the tank; type of substrate or bare bottom (BB), whether the tank will be planted or a biotope.
I have a hardscape consisting of granite (inert) rocks and Wood. The tank is very heavily planted with Bolbitus, blood red rotalla and amazon swords as background with the wood covered in anubius, java fern. I have a mass of tripartita canopying the surface across roughly 1/4 of my tank and attached to the wood structure as well as monte carlo growing on the branches. The foreground consists of small crypt parva across most of the remaining substrate at the front of the tank. There are lots of places for the fish too relax and get away from one another with the entire front of the tank open for swimming. My substrate is aquasoil, Fluvall Stratum. I switched from gravel to this for plant growth and it has been remarkable. My plants are beautiful with reds and explosive growth and no algae issues.
5) Describe your water changes planned or practiced, percentage and how often. Include if you age your water and use of tap/RO or mix.
With this tank I started off doing weekly water changes (had much more livestock than I currently have and very week plants). I have since worked my way into not really needing to do water changes with regards to Nitrate level as the plants keep the nitrates consistently at or below 10ppm. However, i still do them as Nitrates are not the only thing that can build up (TDS). SO, currently I do 15 gal water change every 2 weeks. I top off in between usually around 5 gal the week between. I use all RO and re-mineralize with equillibrium to a GH of 6. With the 5 gal top offs I do not remineralize since i am not water changing if that makes sense to you. I am just now (today) going to start with a mix RO with tap. I read about aging on this website (thank you!) and discovered why its important. SO I am going to do 15 gal change with 5 gal tap to 10 gal RO. I will remineralize to bring my GH up to 6. my aged Ph combined with the RO at this ratio closely matches that of my tank water. I heat the water to the same temperature in a large bin where i add in the equilibrium, a small amount of ferts for the plants, a little bit of prime for the chloramine from the tap and any not removed in the RO process.
6) Describe the type of filtration planned/used for the tank; sponge, HOB and/or sump. Also include the other equipment you are, or will be, using in your tank, e.g. heater, lighting, etc.
I have 2 Oase 650 thermos (built in heaters) and on one of them I have an in-line UV sterilizer which i run 24/7. I get about 320 gal/hour turnover. Both filters have a pre-filter compartment which I clean once a week. The main filter housings i clean less frequently and they are never dirty. I have bio media balls and sponges in the main filter housing of both filters. I run 2 aeration bubblers which come on about an hour before my light goes off to help bleed of CO2 over night. My filter tank input lines can be set-up as a spray bar; but i currently just have them shooting out of the 90 degree elbows across the top of the water column. My light is a programmable fluval 3.0 and it runs 13 hours total a day but 4 of those hours are gradually ramping up and down., AKA as a sunrise/sunset.
7) If the tank is already setup and running, include the water parameters;
- temp _____78 (will go to 82 if i get discus. prefer this lower end because of the aquatic plants. That is the upper limit for almost all of my plants)
- tank ph _____6.4 to 6.6
- Ph of the water straight out of your tap _____7.4 out of the tap. 8.0 aged for 24 hours
- ammonia reading ____0 in my tank. And anywhere from .5 to 1.0 ppm out of the tap
- nitrite reading ____0 in my tank. a trace in my tap
- nitrate reading ____10 ppm or below in my tank. 1 -5 ppm from the tap
- well water ____no
- municipal water ____yes Dallas city water and I am familiar with their water quality report and EPA standards required.
8) Describe your current or planned stocking levels; number/size of discus and number/type of dither fish. Where did you get your discus from or do you have a proposed source for getting your discus?
SO here's the challenge and i have spent a lot of time picking people's brain on this. I want to run discus with my angels. I know I will have to get rid of some of my angels as they already are at capacity for my tank. I will not turn them back into a LFS so I will have to find a trusted person that i know will take good care of them. I treat my fish like pets. My hope is to keep 5 adult angels and get 3 maybe 4 discus starting at 3-4" as i understand younger is more pronblematic especially given my situation. The only other fish will be 4 cories, 1 clown pleco (3" long full-grown) and 3 siamese algea eaters.
I do not have a proposed source but would love to know a recommended supplier in TX. My preference would be to drive to pick them out as opposed to shipping.
9) Describe your planned or existing feeding regimen. Include what and how often you are feeding on a daily basis.
Currently, I feed 2 times/day. In the morning and evening. I fed best quality flakes I can. Avoid fish meal and use whole fish flake foods. I feed both plant based and protein based foods as my angels are omnivores. I provide algae wafers for my cories and pleco every so often as well as blanched veggies every week or so. I use frozen myso and brine shrimp and hikari frozen blood worms. I use bugbites, spirulina flakes too. Sometimes i pre soak their food in garlic for additional nutrition. If needed i willing to fed more often. When I go out of town I have an automatic feeder thats programmable up to 3 times per day.
10) What are your goals in this hobby? For example are you looking to keep discus in a planted community tank, or do you hope to become a hobby breeder of Discus? Do you want to raise Discus with the hopes of competing in shows?
My goal is to have discus with angels in a heavily planted aquarium with aquasoil. I only want to do so with two conditions. That I am able to find some of my existing angels a good home and that these two fish can coexist comfortably together. I understand the challenges and really need to understand if having 3 discus and 5 angels is doable. Thanks for taking your time to read and help me. It's greatly appreciated.