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Discus FRY!

Dan Crawford

Founder
UKAPS Team
Joined
21 Jun 2007
Messages
3,265
Location
Daventry, Northants
Hey hey, well as you may no the other week i had some discus eggs.......well now i have fry!
That puts to bed the idea that you can't breed discus in anything but RO or HMA, i don't even declorinate my water (only coz i've ran out) let alone run it throuht countless prefilters and membranes.
Anyway, i'll let you know if they stay alive, it's early days yet.

Woo hoo! :D
 
Congrats, BigDanne. I've been tempted by Dicus myself. I do have a RO unit but have stayed away from them because

1. I can't decide which ones I want
2. They come with a difficulty rating
3. They fight each other
4. They like a high tempreture (too expensive)

You appear to have quashed some of my fears. Congrats again, can't wait to see the pics.
 
congratulations mate thats great news. fingers crossed for the little ones.
i've always shied away from discus because of the RO thing. how hard is your water as i may consider discus for my new tank if it's an option without RO.
 
Hi guys, thers nothing to worry about i recon. I've kepth them for less than a year though so i don't have too much evidence of that but either way they must have been happy to have spawned.

My PH is 7.2 and the GH is 14! apparently they wont breed unless the GH is less then 6. THe temp is 30 degrees C.

The RO thing worried me too, i was gong for HMA instead anyway due to the wastage that come with RO.
I do class myself as a good fish keeper but i've done nothing more to this tank than anyone else would have, ie. 50% water changes once a week, good food - frozen beef heart, Gramma discus diet, tetra prima and some tetra min flake. Thats it, there really nothing to be scared of and i never thought of the running costs with regard to the higher temp, shorley the 3 degrees higher thatn the average tropical tank wouldn't make too much difference?

Anyway thanks for the support guys i'll keep you informed.
 
I've never really understood why Discus need such a high temperature. Far as I know they come from the same kind of waters as Angelfish and cardinals and they're happy at 26C or so. The high initial purchase has always put me off. I bought a shoal of panda corys and 4 of those died in the first two days (dodgy batch I reckon). If something like happened to discus at £30 a pop, I'd be most displeased!!
 
The cost of the fish isn't nearly £30 if you go to a local breeder of which there are loads then you can get the highest quality fish youve ever seen for about £15! I use GB Discus in Kettering and they are great. The price obviously goes up with the fish size and if you wanted a full grown 8" discus you will have to pay through the nose but i prefer to "grow" them myself. I buy them at around 2.5 inches and they grow quick. If you go to LFS' then you will pay through the nose for generally poor fish IME.
You don't get fish like this from LFS' or certainly not any LFS i've been to.
Blue2.jpg

IMG_0672.jpg

They will sell you a poor quality red turk at 4" for in excess of £65 where as GB Discus would charge you about £22.50.
(dodgy batch I reckon)
You wouldn't get a dodgy batch from a reputable dealer.

I know that £15 "for a fish" is still expensive but they are well worth it, i spent more than that on a 3" plec and may as well have hidden £15 under a log in the garden!
 
beeky said:
I've never really understood why Discus need such a high temperature. Far as I know they come from the same kind of waters as Angelfish and cardinals and they're happy at 26C or so.

They don't.

It is a common practise by some breeders as in theory it reduces the potency of some diseases, especially white spot and possibly some flagellate protozoan infections. As they had success 'over-driving' their discus others have, quite logically, copied them.

Bear in mind keeping them at elevated levels constantly will shorten their lives, as it would to any fish not naturally living in such hot water.

Well done Danne. They are cichlids and if there's any group of fish that can adapt to different waters and everything else it's them! Well done mate, get some brineshrimp going to really get them growing!
Are they both Solid Blue or is the other parent different? Will get some great looking babies I'm sure!
 
Hi Eds,
Are they both Solid Blue or is the other parent different?

they are the two in the picture, a blue diamond and a red pigeon blood.
Get some brineshrimp going to really get them growing!
Your right, i'm gonna have to start hatching BBS and set up another tank! Here we go!!
Should be fun.
 
Right, bad news! All the fry have been eaten. The parents we too busy fighting with the other 2 discus to notice that every time there back was turned a barrage of cardinals decended on the spawning site. I got one picture of a fry and i'd taken the shot ad was still lookin throught the view finder and cardinal can up an swipped him. GUTTED!
THe parents have abandoned the site so i'm guessin all the fry are gone now. Shame really. Oh well i might set up a bare bottomed tank and see how they go. They seem to just fight with everone else anyway.
Heres the only photo i managed to get.
Picture8.png
 
Bad luck mate. Cardinals are ace fry eaters. In fact, if I remember rightly, fry form a large part of the contents of gut analysis of wild cardinals at the right times of the year! Why I keep all of mine away from the cichlid breeding tanks - Spotted Kribs managed to keep them at bay though and raise 80+ babies!

I hope you so set up a new tank, but there's no reason to keep it bare IMHO, but then you're the one who's bred them!!!
 
Cheers mate, if i do set up another tank it will be purely for breeding those two and probably in my shed or at work maybe coz i have no room in my building site of a house so i don't want to put a lot of effort into setting up a nice tank for what might be a waste of time? I'm hoping if the breeding doesnt work out then i can put them back in the original tank and the time spent away may have altered the pecking order. We'll see. Spare tank at the ready!! ;)
 
Hello, well they are breeding again. I have more eggs, they have layed them on the scabbiest piece of wood in the world but they have layed them so that i can see which is great so here is a pic.
DiscusEggsSmall.jpg


The area of the tank that they have layed them in is in such a place where i might be able to put a divider in to protect the fry from the cardinals. We'll see. Anyway, i hope you like and i'll keep you informed of any further developments.
 
thats great mate the last occasion wasn't a one off then. good luck with them. nice picture. is the blue one "mummy"
 
Cheers mate, the last time all the cardinals ate the eggs! DOH!
is the blue one "mummy"
hard to tell, it had a stumpy vent popping out (you can just about see in the pic) but i'm sure the other one had one too so can't really tell. Some evidence says the blue would be the father but some says otherwise so i am pretty stuck.
 
The female will have a rounded, or blunt ended spawning tube when spawning, while the males will be more pointed. But good luck spotting that while they're 'busy'!
 
More eggs

Hi guys, you might have guessed that the last eggs were unsucessfull (well you'd have known about it if they were sucessfull!) There were 3 unfertilised eggs in the clutch and they grew fungus which in turn infected the rest very quickly, the parents then ate the eggs. In time the parents learn to remove these infected eggs but these parents are only young. You may have notice the increased amount of eggs.
I have gotten a good shot of the breeding tube of the male(?), let me know if you agree whether or not this is a "pointed" tube.
PointedTube1.jpg


Here is the male passing over the eggs.
MalePassing1.jpg


here is the female passing over the eggs with daddy coming coming to investigate the camera.
FemalePassing.jpg


Here are the pair and there eggs.
Parentsandeggs1.jpg


Here are the father and one of my other discus squaring up, the father (right) is about to get his ass kicked as always........
FishFight.jpg


........until mom comes in to help!
FightFightFight.jpg


I hope this is an interesting insite into the habits of young discus and there owner?
I know of one person that has been inspired (jimboo) and i hope that more of you would consider discus since i can assure you that they don't live up to the bad reputation as "the fussiest fish in the world"

Cheers
Dan
 

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