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TROPICAL Which plants work best with discus?
I am setting up a 300 l/66 gal tank for discus. Please could you recommend some plants that would be suitable for this set-up, bearing in mind the higher temperature required by discus?
VAL SYKES
JEREMY SAYS: Lots of plants tolerate or are comfortable with the high 20°s and even low 30°sC that discus prefer. These include Alternanthera, Anubias, Cryptocoryne wendtii, Crinum, Echinodorus, Hydrocotyle leucocephalus, Hygrophila and Microsorum, as well as tropical water lilies and floating plants, such as Frogbit and Salvinia.
What’s important in a discus set-up is where you plant, rather than what you plant, as these cichlids need an area at the front of the tank that is free of plants, where they can feed. Whether you feed sinking discus granules, beefheart, live or frozen food, discus like the food to drop to the bottom where they can blow it and bounce it back up into the water column again before consuming.
Discus also need huge amounts of food fed throughout the day, so a plant-free area will be good for hoovering up any uneaten food.
My favourite planted discus tank was created by a fishkeeper named Barry Cranwell, who used bogwood, plus a lively combination of Anubias, Vallisneria, Echinodorus, tropical water lilies, and floating plants to create an underwater jungle.
I think the fish liked it too…
TROPICAL Why don’t these snails stay underwater?
I keep tetras, otos and snails in a 100-litre, open-topped aquarium. My nerite snails keep coming out of the water at the top of the tank, sitting there most of the day and then eventually just going back into the water again. Why do they do this? All my water parameters are fine.
RAY D.
NEALE ADVISES: The answer to this very much depends on the species of nerite snail. The family Neritidae contains something like 300 different species. The majority live in shallow marine and brackish water habitats, but a fair few live in freshwater.
Although often quite hardy and adaptable animals, nerites tend to favour places with brisk currents and lots of oxygen. They are also well adapted to intertidal environments like rock pools and mangroves, hunkering down onto a solid substrate for a few hours when the water
