Uaru Fernandezyepezi-Panda Uaru Issues

[Festae Forever]

Well, after listening to everyone here I decided to go ahead and order some peat moss. In fact sphagnum peat moss because after reading up I gathered that it was the best. Unfortunately neither of my two local stores had peat or even blackwater extract. So I ordered it from a seller on e-Bay who is only 80 miles from me, so hopefully it gets here quickly.

Thanks to everyone who has replied here. Fishkeepers are by in large some of the nicest people around. Even those who just well wished-Much appreciated. I'll see if I can't get some more photos of them to post in the next few days.

 

[Festae Forever]

Time for an update. The adding of the Roseline's and the Brochis continues to have worked well. The Uaru show a bit less fear and are even venturing to the surface of the water for chow time. That is until I fired up my T5 lighting again to get a good look at them. They spooked immediately and the largest took less then 3 minutes to go into stressed out rapid breathing. Needless to say the lights went out immediately, but it was enough to cause them to take cover behind my show piece of driftwood for the rest of the day. In the few minutes the lights were on I was able to have a closer look at them. They are exhibiting some beginning signs of hole in the head. (This is certainly a learning experience!) Their tank is due for a large weekly water change tomorrow. So I've decided to make a major alteration. The tank they are in is a old school slate bottom aquarium. In order to keep it cleaner I'll be removing the gravel. With the rock bottom I don't think it will spook or hurt them one bit, at least long term. I've seen my fair share of unhappy wild cichlids aimlessly swimming nose down to "get through" a glass bottom. I actually feel like I've caught a small break by having them in this tank. I'll be able to continue being semi-heavy with their feedings (in order to match their sizable appetites) and anything the fish don't get to will be much easier filter or clean up. I think the fish will appreciate the lack of presence of a weekly gravel vac as well. Hopefully this helps the HITH too. Any input on this latest turn of events is welcome as always.

 

[duanes]

There are these lights made today for reef tanks that come on gradually, and go off gradually, mimicking sun rise/sun set.... that might be useful, as the fish may not get so easily spooked.
I tried to keep soft water fish back in the 60s (back then even most oscars were wild caught) in my liquid rock tap water, they'd constantly get HTH along with severums and festivums, while my hard water central types were always HTH free. Mixing your tap with low conductivity , mineral free water may be needed in your case.
I wonder if a planted refugium may also help, a heavily planted refugium may help extract minerals from your tank, as plants can be heavy feeders, and use the minerals such as calcium up. I now use refugiums, especially on one on my Guianacara and Acarichthys tank, that are these days, HTH free, in the same tap water

.

Uaru are vegetarian in nature, is your food low protein, high spirulina?

 

[Aquanero]

A planted refugium will help water quality but unfortunatly any attempt at plants in the tank will only feed the fish. That being said a mix of RO and tap is certantly a viable alturnative. I would float some plastic plants on the surface to break up the lighting Marine land sells the plastic bamboo I use with good results for this purpose. I remove the base and tangel into driftwood or wedge it into the filter tube bracket to shade the tank. Also since this isn't a planted tank. You could remove the T5 fixture and get somthing like the MarineLand Singel bright LED, it's very energy efficent and if you get a size smaller than the tank you can create a good look with subdued lighting and shaded corners. If the tank is 48" for example use a 30" fixture over the center. A heavy planting of Pothos growing out the top of the tank might work to help water quality if the Uaru don't eat the roots, it's worth trying.


Below is how I used some plastic bamboo on driftwood and other plastic plants that have a suction cup to stick to the side of the tank to create shaded areas. Like I said you could also float the bamboo.

 

[decoy50]

Alot of discus keepers shade part of their lights(like Tom said). Bamboo sounds good, I think some people use black poster paper - just be careful that its far enough away from the bulbs. They shade part of the fixture and gradually(over a couple weeks) remove more & more of the covering. Another option would be to keep a nightlight on in the room, or turn on a lamp in the room before you turn on the tank light. It might help them adjust to the light gradually. Keep us posted, I'm interested in these Uaru and would like to see you have success.

 

[decoy50]

I saw in your first post, that youre only doing one large WC a week due to your RO situation. How are your nitrates? I've always heard that these fish require water quality on par with discus. So the heavy feeding along with only one WC a week might be factor in the HITH? Just throwing out some ideas here...

Many discus keepers aim to keep their nitrates under 10ppm.

 

[ryansmith83]

Definitely check your nitrates. Panda uaru are extremely sensitive about water quality. You want to keep them under 10ppm if possible.

 

[duanes]

I agree, even if they are smaller partial changes, the dilution factor and the the stability factor come into play with more frequent changes. I try to do a partial water change, every other day, and beyond that I find the planted refugium can also do wonders for nitrate reduction, my nitrates run approximately 2-5 ppm with it, and frequent changes..

Definitely check your nitrates. Panda uaru are extremely sensitive about water quality. You want to keep them under 10ppm if possible.

 

[Festae Forever]

Okay friends-Thanks for the good input. However, I don't think it's the water. I just dragged myself into the fish room to do a complete water test workup. Here's the details: PH 6.6, Ammonia 0ppm (as yellow as yellow can be), Nitrite 0ppm (as blue as blue can be), Nitrate 0pm (as yellow as yellow can be) and KH 25ppm. That's after not being able to do my water change as anticipated today. Basically it's been a little over a week. The only other thing I can think of is that I am using Polyfilter (which I love). I read somewhere that some mechanical filtration might cause HITH. The fish are certainly not appearing distressed at all and in fact continue to eat like pigs.

I should mention that they are in 90-95% R/O water treated with Kent R/O Right to keep it stable. My tap water is off the charts hard and alkaline. Before the fish arrived I did a 50/50 Tap to R/O split and it tested in the low 8's. Even a 75/25 split left the water extremely alkaline so I ended going with the 90/95% R/O that I'm at now. They are fed better then a 90% vegetarian diet of Spirulina Flake and Repashy.

BTW Aquanero-I LOVE your bamboo look and plan to pirate a version of it from you.
And I'm pretty persnickety about use of artificial plants. Might have reached a happy medium given Uaru's affection for plants.

I went and looked at some cool stuff at a Michael's Craft Store because the selection of plants at my local pet store is woeful. They had a really nice collection of stuff to use, but I've never used anything other than plants specifically labeled for aquarium use. From what I've read it sounds like it should be okay, but I want to be sure. Anyone have experience using plastic/silk plants not specifically labeled for aquariums? Thanks to everyone for the guidance-Please keep it coming.

 

[Aquanero]

Thank's be my guest. I've used silk plants sold for reptiles in my tank before with good results they are basicly the same things as the vines sold at Michaels so I don't think you will have ant trouble using them but I never tryed them. The only thing I noticed is that algae gerw on them do to there porus surface, so that's somthing you might consider. Also make sure the Uaru can't rip them apart and try to eat them. I bought the Bamboo at Petsmart so if you have one around try there. I was in Palm Desert in June and thought I remembered seeing one there. I remember commenting to my son, even in the middle of the desert there's a Walmart, Homedepot and Petsmart.............lol.