problem with one of my discus

[basketcase]

I bought my first discus from a LFS 2 months ago, a school of five juveniles, one of which settled in better than the others. Now the fish that settled in well is dark, not eating much at all and hiding away in a corner. He was the opposite for the first two months. Bright, eating everything in sight and chasing the others around like he owned the place.

The tank was cycled using neon tetras before adding the discus, and i do 25% water changes daily. I use a canister and run an airstone 24/7.

ph - stable at 7.5
temp - 29
nitrate - 0
nitrite - 0
ammonia - 0.5

any suggestions one why this fish has gone down hill and the rest are doing well?

[Boyam]

Sounds like internal parasites to me. i would worm them and lower the Ph to around 6.5 i feel 7.5 is too much.

go to think link: http://www.discusforums.com/forum/viewforum.php?f=15

you will find more than enough info here for treatment. look at Levamisole.

[1fish2fish3fish]

Certainly could be needing a worm med.. I wouldnt mess with the PH if it sits stable, dont touch it now.. that could lead to more problems for all the fish.
what diet do you feed them?..
buying from a LFS its hard to say what you might end up with.. I have LFS discus for now, didnt plan it that way..
have you any pics to post?

[basketcase]

atm they've been fed solely on breeders blend food.

in the foreground of the pic you can see the colour of one of the others.
http://www.discusforums.com/forum/album_pic.php?pic_id=1828

[pink66]

I agree, if the PH is stable, don't mess with it.. stable is way more important than low. mine quite happily sits at 7.3 and the fishies are all just fine.. I notice that your ammonia is showing a reading. That is always better to keep that at zero.. ammonia can indeed be a very nasty character.

I also think Big L may be of assistance to your problem.

Hope he feels better soon :)

[AHC]

Were they quarantined?

I'd look for other signs before jumping in and treating. Clamped fin, Breathing from one gill, slight shaking/scratching/skitish, white stringy poo, being picked on constantly etc are all signs to different things. Sit and watch him for a while.

If he has a clamped fin and breathing from one gill, is skitish, slight shaking - treat for flukes.

Otherwise try a treatment of Big L and go from there.

Get your ammonia down to 0. Try larger water changes. Id also try and vary their diets.

Leave your PH for now as the others have stated.

Good luck :wink:

[Bill Tune]

Is it possible you have had an ammonia spike?
I would have thought in a fully cycled tank you should have 0 ammonia & some nitrates.

[1fish2fish3fish]

are there any other signs of distress than what you mentioned, like the one poster said, any Flukes signs?
You have ammomia readings that says your in need of a water change..
and maybe up your water changes to 50% and I would vary the diet too..

If at all possible can he have his own tank, maybe he would be better off..for some time on his own if hes being chased and having to fight for food, that could definately leed to many other problems..
some Discus can be funny like that..

keep us posted..

[basketcase]

this fish died this morning while i was checking on how he was going.

he wasnt being bullied and his fins were fully intact, but his breathing and colour hadn't improved. he didnt show any sign of flukes.

while i watched him he started smashing around the tank unprovoked, before suddenly ceasing to breathe.

all the remaining fish are happy and healthy.

[AHC]

Sorry to hear about the loss basketcase. :cry:

[1fish2fish3fish]

Im so sorry!.. :cry: shame you had to see it happen.. :( dosent make it any easier..
good you picked up on the signs that something was wrong..maybe there was not much one could have done, it was just to be.
your doing something right! the rest are thriving.. :wink:

[AHC]

mmm keep an eye on the others still. If no direct signs of flukes, worms or bullying but they fall ill - treat with a broad antibotic like Tetracycline.
Lots of veried food and fresh water will help them grow stronger and fight off pathogens etc.

Quick question - did you quarantine them? Andrew Soh has a nice QT process which is great. Should get the book if you dont already have it.

Dont let this death get you down to much. Look at it as a learning opportunity. :wink:

[basketcase]

ill defintely vary the food from now on and consider larger water changes.

They went into a fresh tank which was only occupied by the tetras i used to cycle it over a period of 12 weeks. Should i have done some sort of QT before this? I can't see how i could have...

turns out the earlier nitrate reading was false i tested again and it was at 15 or so.

[AHC]

I would have. QT allows you to observe your fish for a period of time and if necessary treat any ill fish before they go into their new home. The whole point of QT is to stop cross contanimation of live stock, making sure your fish are free of any nasties. So during this time you could have treated him without effecting any already residing fish.

If he died from possible pathogens like internal parasites (im not confirming he did)? there is a high rish your other fish might be infected. Standard practice at that stage would be to treat all fish - Observe, then transfer into their new home once all is ok. A spare tank is needed for this QT process. Nothing big or flashy. Its also good practice to have a spare tank to be used as a hosiptal if you ever need it.

In saying all this, you did mention the tank they went into was newly cycled with tetras. Is it BB? Leave them for now as you say they are all happy and healthy but in the extreme circumstance that they fell ill, you could possibly treat the tank, removing the filter (run it in a bucket) for an antibotic like Tetracycline as it will wipe out all the good bacteria. You didnt have other discus in the new tank so cross contamination wouldnt happen. But its still good practice to quarantine fish for the purpose of making sure they are 100%.

Hope this helps,

[Heiko Bleher]

Hi,

this is Heiko Bleher and I just saw this photo of this discus and wanted to give some advice:

1. This fish is not in a good condition (to dark);
2. it is well behind in his age. The fish is probably more than 10 month old and totally behind in size, that means it was not feed accordingly(correctly) during the most important time of growth (the first days and month).

If you want to recover this discus, you shoukld first of all place it separate from all others (unless the others look similar, than keep them together anfd do the same following treatment to all):
than try to keep them at 30 degrees centigrades and feed them carefully at least 6-times-daily (only always the quanity they eat in 2 minutes, otherwise it spoil the water).
If they do not eat what you give thme change the diet. THEY MUST EAT otheriise you will loose them and no recovery possible.

You should have some live food as tubifex (you have good tubifex down under), Daphnia, mosquito larva. They must chase the food to become discus again (as now they are miserabler).

Pleasr take my advice.

All the best

Heiko Bleher
www.aquapress-bleher.com

[Hollowman]

Heiko,

Nice to see you posting, but I want to take issue with your recommendation to use live Tubifex Worm. It is a fact that tubifex is cultured in stagnant water and therefore is going to inherently be carrying all sorts of parasites and bacteria. I have always tried to persuade people not to feed this food for that very reason, I would even not feed the irradiated blister packs, and never have. Even though, and I appreciate your knowledge of wild fish and their feeding habits in the wild, but this being a domestic strain, and in poor health right now, it will not have the immunity to fend off any bacterial or parasitical attack it might get by feeding on live tubifex. In my opinion, this advice might send out the wrong message to those who might not be quite so experienced in looking after discus.

Steve

[ILLUSN]

Hi Steve,
Heiko is correct in saying we have good worms in Oz, Mal cultures live blackworms, these are grown in a purpus built farm with constant fresh running water, he garantees these to be clean from the farm. drop him a pm to MalcomC for some more info, or check out the web site

http://www.blackworms.com.au/

the hard part is keeping them in good condition from the farm to the store, but if you could get them direct there shouldn't be any problem feeding them, they are good for putting weight onto skinny fish, and for getting not eating fish to eat, I've also used them to get finiky fish onto beefheart.

[Hollowman]

Hi ILLUSN,

I have seen some of these black worms myself, the freeze dried type and they were some of Mal's (I got a sneek preview of them in the UK)

But black worms are not tubifex are they? unless I am wrong (it's been known :lol: )

In 'Penang Discus' by Shaifullah Yeng, page 74, he has a whole page about the rights and wrongs of tubifex, and how to clean them. I do think black worms are different in this case. In the book Yeng takes 5 days to clean the worms using running water, then treats them with an anti-biotic before using. I just wouldn't take the risk.

I will bow to your greater knowledge though mate. :wink:

Steve :)

[ILLUSN]

My bad Steve, you 100% correct they are an entirly differant species.

[Hollowman]

My bad Steve, you 100% correct they are an entirly differant species.

:lol: I'm not scoring points mate :wink:

:lol: :lol:

[1fish2fish3fish]

Hello all, I wanted so bad to feed live worms and I did for about 4 days, they all absolutly loved them. Apon hearing some of my friends here and the reading Ive done about keeping them in good shape ( as Im new to disucs and feeding habits) I was scared to take it any further, I had not the right set up to keep them in ideal shape, rinsing them everyday I just felt wasnt enough, so I disposed of them right away.
They came from my supplier through my work (LFS) which im sure they were cared for properly, but wouldnt know for sure..so I was not taking the chance..
anyone with easy care guide and pics would love to see them..
hope the poster doesnt mind me asking this on the thread, someone can move it needed..
and a big Hello to Heiko Bleher, so nice to hear from you!
Sue