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which is the best size to get, as i found this breeder who sells like angelfish....nickle...dime...quarter.... etc... sizes.

So is nickle alittle too small to be getting, hardyness wise. They will be the only thing in the tank at the time.

Hi,

The bigger you can get, the better. As discus grow, imperfections and runts start to appear. The bigger that you can afford to buy, the more obvious these problems are and you can therefore easier to avoid.
However, at the smaller sizes the price will be cheaper and you can afford to buy a greater quantity and cull the problem discus yourself.

Cheers,

I kinda like very small fish or large adult ones, I didnt have good luck with the third grown specimens, often the legacy of other peoples bad feeding,monotypic diets and lousy water quality meant that a lot of the midrange stock werent very good. A lot of them sometimes end up suffering in suboptimal conditions as long term petshop captives. The price of a discus can mean it stays on the shelf a long time and suffering all the usual inadequecies in care of the average petshop. Also wild caught fish at that age dont take acclimation very well.

Id go for a small baby and raise it myself at a most vulnerable time before nutritional problems can set it back for life, literally off the adults sides , or an adult fish that you can tell is big beautiful and perfectly formed with no sign of hexamita that might not show so radically in a smaller fish. A big fish might not have many years left on the clock, but if you want them to breed for you , you get a good choice of standard and partner selection, plus if you treat them well, theyll get to it straight away.

I figure hardiness is more about condition than size with discus, and well, call me mistrusting if you must, but Id rather see a discus through its formative years myself with no screw ups, rather than trusting a fish that may have been raised with poor nutrition for a year or so.

thanks for the replys.

im not looking to show or breed them for anything so i wouldnt mind little faults here and there.

ill probably be looking into smaller guys.

What size tank are you putting them in? I ask because when getting small/young specimens IME they fair much better when treated as a schooling fish and kept in larger groups. They eat better and are over all much more comfortable in the tank.

Remove the runts amd imperfect fish as they grow.

Present: L183, L114, L330, LDA33, L059, L340, L136, L399, Clown, Whip Tail

Past: L001, L239, L200, L134, L030, L110, L204, L260, LDA08, L226, Ancistrs sp3 albino as well as calico, L187 (sp2), Common Hypostomus punctatus