discus & tetras

[eidos]

Hi to all,

Need some advice... i got a tank of about 50 cardinal tetras in a planted tank and i recently introduced 3 discus into the tank.
My qns is, how do i ensure the discus gets to eat the food as the cardinals are always first to finish the food and also the discus dont seem interested in the commercial fish food (they were fed worms in the shops)

Regards..

[Kingfisher]

Same here but I have 100 Cardinal Tetras and my discus don't seem to like those dried foods. They are brine shrimps, worm and other live foods however.

[unicorn]

Well guys if you have the choice, feed them with blood worms. Discus could be train to feed from hands.

Try using a pincher to feed them they will come once they are comfortable in the new environment. patient...

cheers

[plantmania]

Takes a while to ween newly introduced discus to dried food. Took me about 4 to 6 months, depending on the personality of the discus and its previous feeding behaviour.. Here are some steps.

1) Let fish "learn" that when you approach, food is coming. This might be bloodworms and followed by dried food. My discus becomes excited when someone approaches the tank and tends to eat anything that floats down, even broken pieces of plant( I have one wierd discus )....

2) Get slow sinking dried food like Sera's bits . I find that some of my discus have poor "aiming"/"pecking" skills, can't seem to get the pellet into their mouth. The dominant discus(s) will hunt the gravel for leftover food.

3) Give them time, eventually they will be used to the new environment and starts feeding normal. Especially the way other fishes ,like the cardinals, feed , it will encourage the discus to test out the food as well. Some of my discus had returned to a "wild" behaviour, e.g checking the gravel for food bits , scanning the surface of the water for floating food...

4) Of cos , varies the food given. I gave pellets , flakes , bloodworms and brine shrimps(rarely one type but a combo). Obviously the bloodworm are a real treat, good to get them into a feeding frenzy.... For me only 1 cube for 7 discus , followed by sinking pellets after they've consumed the cube.

Regards.

[eidos]

i intend to just keep my discus on a commercial feed diet. the discus have been in my tank for over 2 weeks now and they seem fine. still havn't really see them go for the food yet, but they do sometimes peck at the gravel. Hope to see them feeding like my tetras soon.
Cheers!

[steve]

hi,

i also introduced 2 discus in my planted tank with cadinal and rams 2 weeks ago. Till today the discus still in bark colour and refuse to eat and also appear unhappy, do i need to separate them from planted tank?

tks
[]

[eidos]

hi !
My discus till today dont seem to go after the food yet. And the tetras are always fast to gobble the food that was meant for the discus. I have seen the discus pecking the gravel, but they dont seem to be picking up the food.
Dont think they can be hand fed as they tends to flee when i dipped my hand into the water. Really hope their growth wont get stunted because of this.

[Simon]

eidos, they need time to recognise the owner.. always start with their normal food (need to check with the seller) then as time progress, they can slowly change the food

[eidos]

They were fed blodworms by the shops where they came from.
Okie, i guess i got to get some for my discus, but i've heard that bloodworms sometimes carry parasites, even those frozen ones.

But i hope they can get to it before the tetras does.

Thanks!

[Simon]

eidos, I uses Hikari Bloodworm for my discus... so far, no problems.. remember to change water regularly, discus like clean water

[eidos]

well, my wife dont like the idea of having frozen worms in the freezer... i've heard of pple using listerine to wash the bloodworms and rinsing it with water to rid of parasites etc before feeding to the fish. any idea whether it works? Or any other suggestions??

[eidos]

Hi, went to get some hikari bloodworms today. fed 1 cube to my discus. Finally see them going for the bloodworms. But 1 of my discus seems to have very bad eyesight as it keep missing the worms. Is this normal?
and they took in the worms and puff it out again, any reason for such a behaviour? or r they just trying to get used to the worms.