I'm very new to this whole forum thing and quite new to discus too so please forgive me before I start. I as given a breeding pair of blue diamonds about 4 months ago who have regularly spawned on their cone very 7-9 days like clockwork. They are in a tank on their own that has just a scattering of gavel, an airstone, minimal decs ( in the front room so didn't want it too bare). The tank is 36x15x19, has an eheim 2300(might be wrong but am at work on nites!) filter and the water parameters are nitrite 0 nitrate 20 ammonia 0 pH is around 6.5 (have used a buffer with no probs for 2 months) but the GH & KH are high, as I live ina hard water areaand the temp is 30 degrees.

I wanted a safe and simple solution to my hard water 'problem' ( & if I'm truthful fairly cheap) as although I had the fish because I'm mesmerised by them, I thought it was a pity that their eggs never came to anything, quite probably due to the GH/KH. I can't afford the cash or space for an RO gizmo and don't drive so transporting RO water as regularly as I'd need it to maintain levels isn't viable at the mo. I was discussing this with a fellow discus enthusiast who said to try using a water softener pillow - taking half the gubbins out and rolling it up to prevent any escaping and leave it under the intake pipe of the filter overnight. This I did and didn't see much of a colour change in the tank, went to work and cvame home to do a regular 20% change that eve and test the parameters. All were exactly the same but the fish looked awful.

Everything bout them looked like what I think sounds like HITH, they were dark -the female almost black - whiteish jelly poo holed up in a corner of the tank by the heater - within a couple of hours she looked like she'd been too close to the heater with what I thought ws a burn right by her top fins. As you can imagine I was terrified for them and gutted, although proven breeders I loved the for themselves and honestly thought I was about to lose them.

The only thing I could put it down to was the softener pillow despite the parameters being no different. Anyway, I tried some discus diease treatment, (Hexamita??) thinking it couldn't hurt but didn't hold out much hope to be honest. 4 days later, George is back to his old self and Mildred's colour is definitely lightening, she's much more friendly, to the point of eating from my hand and the 'scarring' is noticeably lessened. I've kept the water changes the same, every other day and adjusted the dosage slightly as recommended with very tightly crossed fingers, especially as my ward sister doesn't appreciate my being "preoccupied just because of a couple of fish" - How dare she!! Touch wood so far I seem to be doing the right thing but would appreciate any input and advice from you geniuses and apologise profusely for how long this is!!

love
Calli (robynemma) (IMG:style_emoticons/default/dribble.gif)