Discus & Malawis

Tristan · Post by **Tristan** » Thu Sep 30, 2004 3:00 pm

Obviously not in the same tank but I supply both discus and malawis to some localshops when the critters are breeding in sufficient quantity.
The malawis are mainly labidochromis sp caeruleus, perlmutt & Hongi as well as some rustys. I did breed Aulonocara sp but the young take about a year to colour up and i would rather use the tanks for other purposes than holding brown fish.

I have supplied red turq discus to shops locally but without an RO unit at the moment so collecting 10 gallons of water a day from the local shop and climbing two filghts of stairs finally tweeked my back out of place so no more of that for a while.

I have wisely, or otherwise, decided that my first catfish breeding project would be with zebras

Not sure that it is the easiest of tasks but discus were my first try at breeding fish so why not give zebbies a try

Rob · Post by **Rob** » Fri Oct 01, 2004 11:18 am

Sounds like the zebras are the project for you. There seems to be a bit of a link between discus keepers and zebra keepers.

How did you find it breeding labidochromis caeruleus?

rob

Tristan · Post by **Tristan** » Fri Oct 01, 2004 12:43 pm

Labidochromis kind of do it themselvevs, like all malawis, put them in a tank, keep the water clean, feed them and off they go, i think. My personal experience has been that spawns are more vigerous if you mix species in a tank, i tried keeping caeruelus in a tank on their own and not a great deal happened. I suppose that it may be some long term survival thing but add other species to the tnk and the females are holding every 6 weeks. I often separate the female after stripping her of fry (3 weeks after first noticing her holding) just gives her some time to recouperate and feed up before the amorous attentions of the male start again.

Adam · Post by **Adam** » Thu Oct 07, 2004 2:24 am

Been thinking about malawis for quite a while now. Looks like you're the man to talk to, may PM you at some point for some more info if that's ok. You should get your back seen to as problems in that area can be long term.

Tristan · Post by **Tristan** » Thu Oct 07, 2004 9:58 am

No probs adam either PM me or use my email, always happy to talk to anyone about any type of fish. Your right backs can be a real bugger. I think that it is all sorted now, hopefully, believe it or not my sister is doing a 4 year degree in acupuncture and recomended a local bloke who had me sorted in 6 weeks there were a whole list of rugby related injuries he dealt with as well that had been plagueing me for 5 years, all sorted now.
Anyway, i digress, pleasefeel free to contact me about malawis, I love 'em.

Adam · Post by **Adam** » Thu Oct 07, 2004 12:15 pm

Top man. I must admit that I would be a total novice when it comes to Malawis so be prepared for some pretty basic questions, thanks for the offer.

My turn to digress now, I used a chiropracter a few years ago to sort out a nigiling shoulder injury.

Tristan · Post by **Tristan** » Thu Oct 07, 2004 12:38 pm

We all started off as total novices and i think anyone who mocks people for asking questions is a bit of an idiot. The only dumb-asses are those who don't ask hence don't learn and end up killing fish. That is one of the reasons that this forum and others like it are so sucessful, people who care for their fish ask questions so that they can look after their fish better.
So far i have only bred 10 different species of malawian cichlid and i have just scaled back due to the zebra invasion taking out my grow out tank / girlfriend complaining about 4 tanks in my bedroom kind of thing. Anyway, fire away.

Adam · Post by **Adam** » Thu Oct 07, 2004 9:16 pm

My sentiments entirely, I couldn't agree with you more!! Another of my pastimes is overclocking PCs. The abuse you get from some of the techies on their forums is disgraceful, been called a n00b a few times

Infact it is actually condoned on some forums, no such goings on here. I'll say it again if I haven't already, this is a great forum

Only bred 10 species of Malawi, well that's 10 more than I've managed. I'm afraid that my breeding exploits don't extend much beyond Corys, Ancistrus and Endlers, oh and gold fish when I was a kid. Like you I will be concentrating my efforts on the zebras, I'm already hopelessly hooked.

I'll be picking up my new tank tommorow, one of Eheims new range of tanks. Not a bad price, it also comes with an eheim external canister filter inc media, heater and lights. It doesn't look too bad either! if all goes well it should be up and running by the weekend. This will be tank number 4 for me as well.

Tristan · Post by **Tristan** » Tue Oct 12, 2004 1:50 pm

Have you got the new tank yet, if so whack some photos up so we can all ahve a look at them.

Adam · Post by **Adam** » Tue Oct 12, 2004 3:42 pm

Hi tristan,

Yes the tank has been up and running since Sunday, no fish yet though. I definately will not be putting any zebras in there for quite a while. I'm afraid that it's not a very pretty sight I'm too

to post any pics yet. My Mrs says that it looks like a sandy crash site, as I told McEve I have problems with interior design. I always have a mental picture of a cross section of an amazonian river bed that I want to recreate but in reality it turns out quite different.

Tristan · Post by **Tristan** » Tue Oct 12, 2004 4:43 pm

I am affraid that i re-arrange the setups in all of my tanks whenever i do a water change so my tank can go from sublime to rediculous in a week. I find that by taking everthing apart gets rid of all the trapped detritus etc so keeping a really clean tank. BTW any news on the zebbies at your local shop.

Tristan · Post by **Tristan** » Tue Feb 01, 2005 10:08 am

Another bunch of Malawis are holding, three Labidochromis caeruleus and one Iodotropheus sprengerae.

The caeruleus that are holding are some of the fry that i have gorwn on, which is always quite satisfying as i am trying to maintain the strong yellow morph of this fish.
Many of the fish you see in the shops are really poor with washed out colours with lots of black spots, nothing like the original specimens that were taken from the lake.

Tristan

sid · Post by **sid** » Thu Feb 03, 2005 6:38 pm

Hey dude....................you breeding discus too?

Post by **Barbie** » Thu Feb 03, 2005 6:44 pm

Adam do you know which africans you're going to stock? If you don't, you might consider a post or two on one of the popular cichlid forums to help you get compatible fish. I used to deal with literally dozens of "wrecks" a week where people would trust their local store for the info. They may mean well, but that still doesn't mean you won't end up with a tank full of fish hell bent on murdering each other!

Barbie

Des · Post by **Des** » Thu Feb 03, 2005 8:56 pm

How many of us Zebra Addicts also keep Discus?
I used to keep and breed Red Turquiose discus about 10 years ago.
Looks like I might be getting into Discus again. I have been looking for some good stock for quite a while, and only this week have seen some absolutely superb specimens which they called "Checkerboards" at a LFS with a ruby red background colour and blue stripes and spots all the way from sunny Vietnam. !!!!

The only problem is that some Discus in their system tanks are not looking too good (being polite) so will have to wait until All is well in their system.

Good thing is if/when I buy them I dont have to set up another tank for them, they can go into the warm 82 F plec tank after being medicated while in a quarantine tank.

Regards,
Des.