Three newly formed Turquoise Discus pairs

[apistomaster]

In the past month I have had tree new pairs of discus form from 8 Turquoise I kept from a spawn last July. I lost one due to an accident but I now have three new mated pairs each of which has spawned twice in the past few weeks beginning at about 10.5 months old. Rather earlier than most of my pairs have formed in the past.
Here is pair 1/3 guarding their eggs laid yesterday morning.


This is pair 3/3 guarding the clear flower pot they are preparing to spawn on. The female of pair 2/3 is in the background trying to drive off the pair because they are intruding into her territory. She will spawn at any time. Her ovipositor is extended.


At this young age they have all eaten their spawns within the first 24 hours but they will mature some more and they will become better parents. These are part of my long term project to break the chain away from the group of Asian imports that were their parents. I had four pairs from the original group and only one pair ever produced fertile eggs and young. This is abnormal unless the fish had been treated with hormones which is my suspicion. These are the only domestic discus I intend to continue to raise. It took two years to get to the point where I have "clean" domestic breeding stock that I know everything about their background. I am also involved with a long term project to breed and raise F1 wild Greens and Blues for sale. More Discus fanciers are beginning to show more interest in the wild types. They will always be only a small subset; the fancy domestics will always maintain their hold but there is much to be said for the natural beauty of wild or wild type discus. The wild project will take a few years before it is fully in place and producing fish.

[Lisachromis]

A very interesting project! Keep us informed, and there's still nothing like a wild discus in my mind.

[apistomaster]

Each of the three new pairs have successfully produced their first fry. The number of fry for each pair was 60 to 80 which isn't bad for such young pairs. That is actually all I have room to raise at any one time and these will be sold during December. I can only sell about 500 Red Turquoise Discus/year within my normal distribution net work. I already have more than more than enough to cover the cost of the new wild fish I am getting(discus must pay for discus), eight assorted Royal and Semi- Royal Blues this month and Red Spotted Greens in December. That will provide the nucleus of my wild discus breeding stock. I have one pair out of my ten Heckels that have begun guarding and cleaning a potential spawning site. I would be more excited if they were Blues or Greens because I have bred and raised them before. I have not had Heckels get beyond the preliminaries before so I will just hope these actually do more but won't be counting on them coming through.

[Lisachromis]

Sigh... I wish I could get some of the fry. As it stands I've had a few setbacks with my discus and have ended up with 2 large and 1 growing discus (4"+) in a 90 gallon tank. They have become skittish again (as expected) since there used to be 7-8 discus in there. I'd love to actually get some larger discus, but I don't want to go through the lfs for this sort of stuff. No one in my area raises discus so I don't have a local breeder to go to. I know what I don't want, but finding what I do is a bit more of a problem.

[apistomaster]

Hi Lisa,
I know you are aware the best way to begin is with a group of 2-1/2 inch discus raised by someone as close to your area as possible. Never buy discus from a fish shop unless you have one whose owner also raises discus. The important thing is that you never start with discus that have ever been deprived of excellent care. Aren't there some discus specialists near you? It is always best to provide them with a dedicated discus tank. One that is bare bottom, with some potted sword plants and allows for ten gallons per discus. It is hard to raise discus within a community tank but you can still keep some Corydoras sterbai, a bushy nose pleco and a school of some Tetras so it isn't too boring. If you give them these conditions they should begin breeding within 12 months after you get them. They will already be 3-4 months old if you buy them at 2-1/2 to 3 inches. My newest breeders were hatched out last August '06. They spawned beginning in their 11TH Month. All I'm saying is maybe you just need a fresh start. Consider your first Discus as the ones you learned the basics with. They grow so fast that you would have nice big fish in no time. I go through a learning period with any new fish species I wish to keep and breed. I don't succeed every first time. I may never succeed in my Heckel Discus project but I am trying again after not keeping them for many years I and I have learned more since my first times with them.

[Lisachromis]

You've reached the heart of my problem.... there is NO local source of 'homebred' discus. One of my discus was bred by a club member, but he lost most of that batch after I got a few from him. He has not mentioned a new batch of fry/eggs since. I don't want to get rid of the bigger ones yet as I KNOW I won't get the quality of these guys again, unless I win the lottery.

It may be possible to raise a batch up again. I'd rather start with most of the early growing past me as I'd rather someone else do the worst work. I do know what to look for with too big eyes etc. I guess I'll just keep these guys for now and keep my eyes open. I do have multiple tanks available to me if I do find a group of young ones I like.

[apistomaster]

Hi Lisa,
I checked out the sponsors registered on simplydiscus.com and found one located in Ontario, Canada. Maybe this is the same source of your original discus, I can't know, but it appears you are fortunate enough to have a source near by. Most of these sources have larger fish available if you don't mind paying for them doing the 'hard work" of growing them out more. I get many requests for information from folks across the country about discus breeders close to them but usually I don't know but I was pretty sure I had come across one in your area before. Maybe they could help you round out your collection with the type of discus you like?

My first of the three new pairs is caring for a new batch of eggs while having young from their last spawn still feeding from their sides. It is nice for the older batch because their parents are holding station. New pairs are not always very skilled at brood care and they were allowing their fry to scatter. This resulted in some losses but even so, they still have a about 40 from their last spawn. That is a nice number to raise; at least as a consolation prize.

[Lisachromis]

Keep us updated on the fry. We like pics of them too. I'll not sidetrack the thread anymore. I sent you a pm regarding the source. Thanks