Uarus And Discus Together - Opinions?

[simonas]

I;ve got my tank set up for discus and tetras but I saw a beautiful large pair of Uaru yesterday and I;ve put a depositon them

They're about disk size of 6 inches. I;ve kept small uarus beforeand always loved them but these are the first of this size I;ve had and I;m aware they get bigger

How do they get on with discus? Do they provide to much cometition for the discus food etc

Also will they eat tetras?

cheers SImon

 

[hamfist]

6" Uaru and larger might well be too boisterous and a bit pushy for discus, unless they are very large and confident discus.
As you have already mentioned, uaru are also very boisterous feeders and tend to push other fish out of the way, which also might make it a struggle for the discus to get enough food.
It might be worth a shot though. It might work. It might not. If it didn't work out, I would not expect your discus to suffer too much in the short term. You might well find yourself needing to offload the uaru though.

As for tetras, they should be fine. My pair of 6" uaru live with a couple of neons, and show no interest in them at all.

 

[simonas]

6" Uaru and larger might well be too boisterous and a bit pushy for discus, unless they are very large and confident discus.
As you have already mentioned, uaru are also very boisterous feeders and tend to push other fish out of the way, which also might make it a struggle for the discus to get enough food.
It might be worth a shot though. It might work. It might not. If it didn't work out, I would not expect your discus to suffer too much in the short term. You might well find yourself needing to offload the uaru though.

As for tetras, they should be fine. My pair of 6" uaru live with a couple of neons, and show no interest in them at all.

cool, having kept them before I suspected that wouldbe your answer. Keeping Uaru yourselfyou;ll understand why I couldn;t resist the big pair in my LFS for £30

 

[hamfist]

6" Uaru and larger might well be too boisterous and a bit pushy for discus, unless they are very large and confident discus.
As you have already mentioned, uaru are also very boisterous feeders and tend to push other fish out of the way, which also might make it a struggle for the discus to get enough food.
It might be worth a shot though. It might work. It might not. If it didn't work out, I would not expect your discus to suffer too much in the short term. You might well find yourself needing to offload the uaru though.

As for tetras, they should be fine. My pair of 6" uaru live with a couple of neons, and show no interest in them at all.

cool, having kept them before I suspected that wouldbe your answer. Keeping Uaru yourselfyou;ll understand why I couldn;t resist the big pair in my LFS for £30

THey are awesome fish. Great characters !

Pics will, of course, be obligatory as soon as you have them !

 

[simonas]

6" Uaru and larger might well be too boisterous and a bit pushy for discus, unless they are very large and confident discus.
As you have already mentioned, uaru are also very boisterous feeders and tend to push other fish out of the way, which also might make it a struggle for the discus to get enough food.
It might be worth a shot though. It might work. It might not. If it didn't work out, I would not expect your discus to suffer too much in the short term. You might well find yourself needing to offload the uaru though.

As for tetras, they should be fine. My pair of 6" uaru live with a couple of neons, and show no interest in them at all.

cool, having kept them before I suspected that wouldbe your answer. Keeping Uaru yourselfyou;ll understand why I couldn;t resist the big pair in my LFS for £30

THey are awesome fish. Great characters !

Pics will, of course, be obligatory as soon as you have them !

Indeed!!!

 

[Heiko Bleher]

6" Uaru and larger might well be too boisterous and a bit pushy for discus, unless they are very large and confident discus.
As you have already mentioned, uaru are also very boisterous feeders and tend to push other fish out of the way, which also might make it a struggle for the discus to get enough food.
It might be worth a shot though. It might work. It might not. If it didn't work out, I would not expect your discus to suffer too much in the short term. You might well find yourself needing to offload the uaru though.

As for tetras, they should be fine. My pair of 6" uaru live with a couple of neons, and show no interest in them at all.

cool, having kept them before I suspected that wouldbe your answer. Keeping Uaru yourselfyou;ll understand why I couldn;t resist the big pair in my LFS for £30

THey are awesome fish. Great characters !

Pics will, of course, be obligatory as soon as you have them !

Indeed!!!

Hi,

this is Heiko Bleher and I just wanted to let you know:
Uaru am. live normally together with discus (I published a lot about that, also in PFK recently under DEFINITE GUIDE FOR DISCUS, as I write every month for PFK several articles).
Important is: If your discus are tank bred variants - very far away from the natural forms (ie Ghost, Marlbaro, Albino form, etc.) then I would NOT suggest to have the Uaru, which most certainly are wild fish.
Wild Uaru and wild discus (or F1 of wilds) are very good mates/friends and should be together. But I would have 3 Uaru, not one or 2.

Best regards fro one who collects and writes about them,

always
Heiko Bleher
www.aquapress-bleher.com

 

[ian]

Bloody heck Simon, you can't get a more reliable source than that.

 

[hamfist]

I still think it's worth a go if your discus are a good size and well settled in and confident. And also if you have a backup plan for the uaru if it doesn't work out.
There are generally no problems keeping uaru in twos. I, and others I know of, do so with great success. Keeping more than two starts to require a pretty massive tank.
From other's experience, single uaru can be very happy also, so long as they are not too young (say 6" or more).

I'd be interested to hear the reasons as to why F0 or F1 discus would react to uaru in such a different way from later domesticated generations of discus.

 

[walkers101]

if the great man says they can't then fair enough i guess but its all down to you if you want to try them you might be lucky

 

[markandhisfish]

Bloody heck Simon, you can't get a more reliable source than that.

agreed . we have discus royalty in our midst

 

[hamfist]

Bloody heck Simon, you can't get a more reliable source than that.

agreed . we have discus royalty in our midst

As for exploring, collecting, breeding and publishing, then yes, absolutely.

When it comes down to making tropical communities work in a (completely non-natural) home aquarium environment, I suspect that Heiko has not actually done too much of that. It takes a lot of time to make good communities work, with a lot of playing around with community members. It's a sub-speciality in itself
Some very un-natural mixes can actually work very well indeed.

 

[ian]

I'm sorry, but I know who'd I'd go with on this one.

 

[snowflake311]

In a 200 gal tank sure. But I have both fish I have 2 uaru we call the mafia because what they want they get. They are pushy and bite my other fish at feeding time. I would never ever think of keeping my 2 with discus but all cichlids are differant. Discus don't do well with other fish that compeat for food.

If you were to add 2 say 3" uaru to a school of adult discus it could work. But large almost adults with small discus not good. I have tetras with my two 6" uaru no problems there.

Edit
sure in the wild uaru are found with discus but they have a whole lake or river to spred out in. Put these fish in a 100 gal tank that 5' things are very differant.

 

[markandhisfish]

yep i rekon the uaru would be too pushy at feeding time mate .

 

[simonas]

we shall see I;ve picked the Uaru up now they are gorgeous actually about 7 inch if not slightly more
they weren;t in my plans but beautiful fish

I;'ll set the tank up as if for discus with the tetras and may actually leave the discus for now and keep the Uaru as the main fish... I like them that much!!

Cheers Heiko.... I;ve read your articles in past andam actually quite chuffed to have you reply to my thread!! Good luck in what you do mate