Temp, Plants, & Bacteria

[Charlotte]

I have been keeping all my tanks above 80 deg F, and the ram tanks closer to 84. I was told yesterday that this would harm my live plants, and that there would not be enough oxygen for the fish and for the bacteria/biofilter, especially at night when the lights are off and the plants are not photosynthesizing.

Will the temp. above 79 really harm my plants? Also, there will be more capacity for dissolved oxygen in cooler water than in warmer water, but will this affect the fish, espacially if they are from an area with such temps? What about the bacteria?

 

[jowens]

I'm no expert, but I can tell you that a lot of what this person told you is hogwash. Hearty plants can deal with high temps. While most would prefer things in the high 70's, I would still say that a tank with adequate lighting will support your basic fast growing/hearty plants even at temperatures as high as 86 degrees. Many discus owners keep planted tanks at these temperatures and have no problems...as long as they focus on easy plants rather than exotic or challenging ones.

While warm water does hold less 02, unless your fish are gasping in the morning, I wouldn't worry too much. If you're worried, run an airstone at night and turn it off in the morning (your plants won't like it during the daytime).

In closing, I'll just say that many many discus keepers have tanks with temps as high as 86F without problems. True, it creates a new set of challenges, but to call these challenges insurmountable is pure silliness. If you want more information on high temperature tanks, just go to a search engine and type in "planted discus tank." Or, start with this one:

http://www.frii.com/~gbooth/AquaticConcepts/Articles/PAM_Discus.htm

 

[Cichlids1]

I agree with jowens. I have 3 tanks that have a temp under 80, all the rest run 80 to 86 depending on what is in there. Most of the tanks are planted with everything from cryptocoryne, swordplants, chain swords, aponogeton, anubias, and the sorts. Nothing too demanding, but all do well. The fish eat well - one of the first signs of something wrong is usually fish not eating - show some intense colors, and even spawn regularly. One of the first questions I like to ask when somebody is correcting an obvious flaw in my fishroom is: "Is this your experience, or something you read?" I'll give somebody's personal experience much greater weight than what the books say most of the time. Good luck and the rams will love you for the warmer temps.

 

[Ron Gretz]

One of the interesting things I picked up this weekend regarding temperature.

I have lost a couple of apistogrammas over the past week for no unexplained reason I can determine, other than in both cases, some scales were missing from the carcass (implying a fungus or parasite).

I had treated my fish previously for a parasite so thought possibly a fungus was at work. I went to the LFS to talk to the fishguy to see if he could tell me anything. When he asked me the temp I keep my tanks at I replied 82f. At which point he said "you have no fungus".

Apparently, the fungus diseases thrive at temps below 66-67f whereas they won't live above 78-80f. Conversely, parasites don't seem to live below about 66-67f while above 78-80f they live like crazy. (A case of damned if you do and damned if you don't).

Thought I would pass this on if anybody winds up with some sort of fish illness. The tank temperature can steer you into a direction with regard to what the problem may or may not be.

At this point, I don't know what the problem is. A few of the fish do seem to be gasping, however in addition to the biowheel, I run an airstone constantly. My question would be, should I drop the tank temperature a couple of degrees?

 

[Charlotte]

The website that j owens put in his post was terrific!
( http://www.frii.com/~gbooth/AquaticConcepts/Articles/PAM_Discus.htm )

Thanks!

 

[Neil]

Charlotte,
I agree with the others. You have to be careful about information you get from any one source, especially in a LFS. I once told a knowledgeable employee in a reputable LFS that I was breeding difficult soft-water fish in pure RO water and they said that wasn't true, because the fish would die in that water. Granted they might have misunderstood the difference between RO and DI water, but they still didn't have the appropriate information to make a blanket statement like that.
There is a lot of literature on plant and it is not difficult to find info on the species that can tolerate warmer temps. Choose your plants accordingly. There is a lot that will do just fine!
Most species of fish that come from areas with warmer water are more tolerant of all the other issues associated with warmer water. So they shouldn't have problems with O2 levels or bacteria. I think that slightly different forms of bacteria are present in different types of water. For example, nitrifying bacteria from very hard and very soft water are probably slightly different.
By the way, I read the Discus article and I think it is great to. Neil

 

[Neil]

Ron,

To try a theory about the question about lowering the temp. in your tank -Sure there is no reason that 80 degrees will harm anything. But, I doubt that that is your problem. I also doubt that you need to run an airstone in your tank. However, as to why your fish are breathing heavily, I am not sure because heavy respiration can be caused by so many things. How many fish do you have in your tank? How heavily do you feed? How often do you do water changes and how much water? Have you added anything new into the tank lately? Are your fish showing any signs of disease externally? You see what I mean! It could be any number of things, but how clean the water is and how the nitrification cycle is managed would be the place to start. Neil

 

[aspen]

about plants and temperature: i successfully kept a 20 gal planted tank with no co2 addition for 8 months or so. this tank was to be an experiment comparing what is said about plants and discus and what i could do.

lighting:
2x 20 watt lamps, 1 grolux, 1 daylight

plants:
roseafolia
hygrophylia polysperma- sunset
red ozelot sword
cabomba carolinia
valisneria

water parms:
my tapwater, gh8, kh4, ph 7.8- 8.0
water changed almost daily, 90% for weeks on end never smaller than 40% every 2 days, always with heated aged aerated tapwater (from 15 gal in stand underneath the 20 gal).

substrate: plain white silica sand

fish:
1 adult discus
a pair of rams
8 rummynosed tetras
a few otos

i maintained daily water changes for weeks on end (supposed to be bad for plants) ran the temps into the 90's for weeks on end, with aeration added, added fert (tropica master grow) in the water column only, at small doses at a time, then changed out the water after a day or two, and basically pushed all of the limits as much as i felt i could. all plants thrived as much as could be expected with no co2 addition, and fish were always healthy, with no disease problems. in fact the rams kept spawning, until i put them into tanks by themselves. then they just swam around until i put them back into the planted 20. tank temp was ramped up to the 90's not just cranked up, and i actually treated the discus with epsom salt for a food blockage while the temp was up. i was able to harvest quite a few cuttings of most of the plants and sell them for supplies to my lfs in that time.

jme, rick