Discus Gone Black and Unreponsive

[rburrowes]

Hey Guys,

I am pulling my hair out, my main tank were I have been holding 4 really nice adult super erruptions, with perfect water conditions has started to drive me insane.

The water parimeters are perfect, yet all four of them have gone dark, they were breeding/laying eggs for the last 3 months with out issue. Now all of a sudden they have gone dar, 2 of them arnt really eating, and they are unresponse and can spook when my son is near them. I have been doing 50% daily water changes for the last 2 weeks which out much improvement.

I cranked the temp to 31 Degrees and put in a handful of salt, a couple of days ago, no change.

Now I can see one of the males has like a white fungus around his month and a sprinkling of white around his gills.

Its got me stumped, any help would be appreciated.

Cheers

Rob

[rburrowes]

Forgot to say, filters are cleaned montly, stagered basis, so no cycle appears evident.

[swifto]

Up your temp to 34,add a palm size amount of salt daily,could b they cotton mouth disease or white spot,add meds accordantly.But some one else with more experience will no more.

[ILLUSN]

Just out of curiosity do you live in sydney and have you done a water change recently.

my peps are looking TERRIBLE after the last water change despite a tripple dose of supa chlor.

I'm thinking the tap water is way off.

[swifto]

For got water change daily

[rburrowes]

Thanks swifto, i've had that in place for the last week. Put in some Protozin today, we'll see how that goes. Fingers crossed

Jothy, I'm based in Melb, and to be honest the issue has been occuring for a few weeks now and the only thing different is the water. I've been doubling up on prime. Just about to resort to a R/O unit to remove that from being a possible issue.

[BigDaddyAdo]

Up your temp to 34,add a palm size amount of salt daily,could b they cotton mouth disease or white spot,add meds accordantly.But some one else with more experience will no more.

How can you suggest how much salt to add without knowing the volume of water?

[swifto]

Up your temp to 34,add a palm size amount of salt daily,could b they cotton mouth disease or white spot,add meds accordantly.But some one else with more experience will no more.

How can you suggest how much salt to add without knowing the volume of water?

I believe salt is added at a rate of table spoon per 40ltrs.

[Mr Wild]

Correct 1 tblsp per 40 litres and only add back enough salt to compensate for the wc volume
eg 500 litres of tank water / 40 = 12.5tblsp

you change 50% water - only add back 6.25 tblesp salt does not disappear and you don't want to be trying to change your discus into salt water fish!

[rburrowes]

Just an update, looks like the issue resides with Melbourne Water, I bought a 2 stage water filter and have almost done a 100% water change over the last day and a half, added some almond leaves and bang discus are now responsive. So happy to see them swimming around again.

Havent got all there colour back yet, but where taking baby steps. Did notice that one of them has an enfamed eye, looks like its has an infection. Assuming clean water and more clean water will resolve the problem.

FYI.... Protozin and peps dont mix, had a colony in the bottom of the tank before I dosed it, there all now in the bin. Not happy jan, this experience has almost made me give up fish as a hobby.