# feeding discus community



## morefish4me (Mar 22, 2008)

Hi,

I recently picked up a group of 7 discus from a local breeder and I am wondering what I should be feeding them long term. Currently, I am feeding them a frozen beefheart mixture sold to me by the breeder. The discus seem to eat this just fine. However, I am not sure this is the best long term food, especially for the tank mates (cardinal tetras, lemon tetras, ramsa and cories). I was wondering if I should slowly switch to something else. I am considering feeding one food in the morning and a different food in the evening. Any suggestions/comments are appreciated.

Thanks,

Nate Terry


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## Number6 (Mar 13, 2003)

New Life Spectrum always worked fine for all my fish, Discus included.

My only warning is that with Discus, if it ain't broke, don't fix it. If beefheart was being used by the breeder, and has worked for you, then I would stick with it unless there was a solid reason to change.

:thumb:


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## DeadFishFloating (Oct 9, 2007)

G'day *morefish4me*,

Are your new Discus juveniles or adults?

Beefheart blendes are a pretty common food for Discus.

If your Discus are juveniles, then they will need more than two feedings a day. It's common practice to feed juveniles up to six times a day. This is part of the reason why growing out young Discus requires such a heavy water change schedule. Every day water changes or every second day.

When I was growing out a group of juvenile Geophagus I maintaned a two a day feeding schedule. Every second morning I would feed a variety of frozen Hikari products; blood worm, brine shrimp, mysis shrimp and spirulina brine shrimp. The alternate morning I would feed crumbled NLS (New Life Spectrum) H2O wafers. Evenings I would feed NLS 1mm cichlid pellets or NLS 1mm Thera+.

Now days I alterante between NLS and Hikari dry foods; Hikari Cichlid Bio-Gold, Micro Waffers & Algea Waffers, and NLS H2O Flake, H2O waffers, 1mm Thera+ and 1mm Cichlid pellets. With occasional feedings of frozen foods, maximum 3 times a week.


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## ryansmith (Apr 10, 2003)

Remember that beefheart is messy and can easily foul your water. Any uneaten food needs to be vacuumed out really well. This is why a lot of discus keepers grow their fish out in bare bottom tanks. It's much easier to keep them clean when you're doing multiple feedings a day.

When growing out my discus, they only got beefheart occasionally. They ate mostly bloodworms and mysis shrimp along with as many dry foods as they'd take. Those included ONF1 flakes or pellets, earthworm flakes, and even the catfish chips that I fed to my plecos.

Starting them with a variety foods as juveniles is a good idea. Sometimes when discus have only been fed one or two types of foods, they're reluctant to accept other things as they get older.

In my opinion, they don't really need to be fed any differently than other cichlids. Sure, beefheart is good for bulking your fish up, but I think most breeders used it to get the maximum size in a short amount of time. Also, it was probably cheap and easy to make in large batches. Some discus keepers and breeders don't use it at all.

When I fed it, I bought the frozen San Francisco/Sally's brand. It's pure beefheart without things like flakes or vitamins ground in. Usually homemade beefheart includes things like garlic, white fish, flakes, pellets, spinach, and baby vitamins. If you're feeding a variety of dried foods, you probably don't need beefheart mix with all the additives.

Ryan


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## morefish4me (Mar 22, 2008)

The discus are about 2 1/2 - 3 inches.

As for why I'm changing the diet...eventually I'll run out of the current beefheart mix and the breeder is an hour away, so I will have to change the discus to something else, although I have a month or two or do it. However, I want to make the change gradually because I have heard many people say that discus are picky. In fact, I have seen my discus be pretty choosy on the few occasions when I've tried new foods.

I am mostly concerned about making sure that the tetras are getting some reasonable nutrition for them. I guess I've heard a few things on wet web media about fish getting aquatic derived foods. So I guess that I'll switch to bloodworms for the evening feeding and try some sort of pellet food for the morning feedings.


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## star rider (Mar 20, 2006)

start to slowly wean them off the beef heart.

mix it with some flake, pellets etc..they will eventually move away from beef heart.
at 2.5 -3" these are still young and would benefit by several feedings per day(at least 4)


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## Dutch Dude (Sep 14, 2006)

Discus of that size is real working,...lots of feed (4 to 6) and daily water changes of at least 50%. I feed mine 2 times beefheart, 1 pellets, 2 bloodworms (frozen) and 1 or 2 artemis (frozen) and several times a week live foods (daphnia, bloodworms, artemis). When they grow larger you can reduce the number of feedings. Mine are now 5 inch TL and receive 1 beefheart, 2 small quanteties pellets, 1 bloodworms and for desert artemis.

At a small size discus grow quit fast. In this period growth is very important so you need to feed nutrition and protein rich foods. Once they reach the 4 inch they significantly slow down in growth.


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