Hi everyone As requested this is the start of my experiences with Discus on water,foods and growth rate.Too much to write all the once so I'll keep adding as I get the time.I realize not everyone will agree with me and these are only my experiences nothing more, the golden rule of the more you know the more you realize you don't know is very apparent with Discus. I just don't want it to turn into a debate of right and wrong and lose sight of the meaning.
Growth rate,resistance to disease,breeding etc are all directly tied into water quality,They will breed in bad water,but maybe only a few will young survive.It doesn't matter how good our food is,if the water quality is bad its only a matter of time before our discus get sick.
I believe Discus are easy to keep its peoples failure to keep them in proper water that kills them.I always treat the water with Potassium permanganate to kill off bacteria.Then add hydrogen peroxide,this eliminates most disease problems after a water change.I know breeders that use dam water with great success.They have had no problems at all,(this always really annoyed me HaHa as I had to go to so much trouble).
P.H. Ideally should be 5.0,this helps stop bacterial infections,unfortunately not parasites.(I have taken the P.H to 3.0 with no effect on Ichthyobodo) I usually go for 5.5 with my breeders.One thing i noticed which surprised me was on a system of 12 pr,(usually the hormones from one breeding pr triggered the others to spawn)At 5.5,Nine out of the 12spawns had an excellent hatch rate the other 3 were completely infertile.To experiment later on I raised the P.H.to 6.8,the three I thought were infertile produced large batches of fry.Yet the other 9 spawns all failed.And for a month or so after I lowered the P.H back to 5.5. P.H is very much an individual thing for Discus,although my best results by % are at 5.5.Although for wild heckels 5.0 may be better.This may also be because most breeders around the world use a P.H. of 5.5.Jack wattley recommends large scale breeders should use a P.H of 5.0,And no doubt would have a good reason(maybe to prevent bacterial infections spreading around the world through the importation of discus?,or not,only he knows) I would follow his advice more so than mine. We once rang an exporter of Discus in the Amazon,He told us where he catches them in the wet season the P.H was 5.5 in the dry season 3.0. Food for thought.
I was going to go through my experiences on water parameters,than food,this may bore the more advanced Discus keepers out of there brains,so if I'm going down the wrong path please say.