Hello - Guess I won't be here long!

[danwil77]

Hello everyone! I just finally got my first Discus, 4 of them, on Thursday afternoon after spending a month making sure my tank was ready to host some Discus. Well it's Sunday morning and I'm down to 2 discus and one of them seems listless...

I'm really frustrated; my ph is 6.5, GH 3, Ammonia 0, Nitrate 0, Temp 84F... it's a heavily planted tank with only a few very peaceful inhabitants... I tested the water that they came in (They came from a dealer to my LFS and I bought them without them ever leaving thier shipping bag) the Ph in there was about 8, ammonia was 3mg/l.... They survived for a couple of days - could the trauma of the trip/bad water still be causing deaths?
Oh - they're young fish, they're only about 2.5 inches in diameter...

It was an awful lot of work to get everything the way these fish like it and they're not cheap fish... I'm really angry right now and I needed to vent (i've been lurking on this forum for a few weeks while getting this all setup)

So at this rate I'll have no discus by Tuesday (I'm losing one per morning) so this may be my one and only post... If you're still reading then thanks for reading my rant...

Frustrated in NY,
Dan

[Fishpimpin73]

How long did you take to acclimate them to your water conditions?

If you rushed through it, the shock of taking them from a ph of 8 to a ph of 6.5 could be the culprit.

If it had been me, after testing the ph in thier bag and finding it that high, I would have returned them right away.

How much did you spend on these fish?

[danwil77]

I drip acclimated them in a bucket for about 2 and a half hours...
They were a special order from my LFS since he said his water is too hard to keep them in stock, that's why I picked them up still in the bags they were shipped in.
He gave me a pretty decent deal, I've been going to him for fish and equipment for years so he sold them for $18 each... No guarantee on them tho since even before he ordered them for me he said they're very hard to keep...

[danwil77]

Well one of the remaining two is floating around on his side now and not lookin so good.
So soon I'll officially be down to one... that one seems quite healthy but who knows... unfortunately this situation makes me want to tear down my entire setup that I've had for years... this totally sucks...

[Merrilyn]

So sorry to hear of your bad luck Dan.

The high ammonia in the bag could be responsible too. Ammonia destroys the gill membrane, making it difficult for the fish to breathe.

How are the remaining two fish looking? I hope they survived.

[danwil77]

Well I'm down to one, but he seems pretty healthy, seems alot more active than I thought discus were supposed to be. He eats really well and seems to school with the little bolivian rams...
Since he seems so healthy it makes me think that the deaths of the other three might not have been my fault. My plan is to add one per month from here on out as long as all goes well...

[wickedglass]

dude, hang in there. losing 3 is pretty bad, but losing a tank of 20 through stupidity and ignorance, although I should have known better, like I did is worse ... and I know it was my fault. I felt like a bad parent when that happened.
If your discus is doing well after going through the same ordeal the others went through, you must be doing something right!

[danwil77]

You're right, losing 20 would put me in the looney bin! I feel so guilty whenever I lose a fish because of something I did (its happened more than I'd like to admit unfortunately).
I actually got two beautiful pigeon blood discus from a different LFS last Thursday (today's monday) for only $15/ea because someone special ordered them and didn't pick them up. Since I brought them home one has seemed sick while the other is doing great.
The sick one is in a small hospital tank right now with a little salt and the temp is up to 90F... He's got some white fuzz on him, not ick but something else... this is the 2nd time I've had him in this hospital tank, he got all better and I put him back in the main tank yesterday then he went right back to being sick and having this fuzz on him again... So now he's been in the other tank with salt for a few hours and he's already swimming upright again and the fuzz is gone... I wonder if I have the worlds first brackish discus?!?!?!
Discus certainly are frustrating, but so cool that it's worth it!