My name is Tie Hok Thai, but my friend calls me Aan. I started out in Discus back in 1981-82 as a hobbyist, but it lasted only for 1 year. At that time I had Turquoise and Cobalt that I got from a local discus breeder.

I started out in Discus again in 1999, and at that time I was into Discus as a full time breeder. I started with 100 pieces of 1.5cm Marlboro Red that I bought from a local breeder for growing them out. I selected few best pieces for myself and sell the rest after 1 month. Then I moved on to start buying adults and I ended up buying 13 adults and was able to get 5 pairs from it.

The strains that I'm breeding at the moment are - Blue Diamond, Heckel, Marlboro Red and RSG

I have total of 52 grow out tanks and 25 breeders tanks.

At one stage I've ever got 300 fries hatched and attached to the parents. It was a Red Spotted Green strain.

I started breeding RSG back in the year 2000. I bought a male 6 inch wild (F0) from a local importer. I crossed the male RSG with my female Snakeskin, and currently they are now at F3 generations, with F4 on the way.

During my breeding time with RSG, in my F1 generations, I came across a batch of fries (40 fries) that has got a black edge at their tail and I purposely kept them to know how will be the next generation be. I tried breeding them again but was unable to get this kind of black edge trait. Currently I'm doing it again, to see whether I could get this kind of trait or not.

I've bred Heckel x RSG, the male was a wild (F0) heckel while the Female was my F3 RSGxSnakeskin cross, at the moment I have fries from this crossing and they are at 2 inches. I'm looking forward for them to grow and hope the trademark from the male (the thick centre vertical bar) is inherited by the fries. I use a foster parents (nanny) to carry the fries.

Currently I'm trying to breed my Heckel x Heckel discus, but it will take sometimes for them to breed.

I don't use any special treatment, they just pair up and produce fries at my normal aged tap water. I don't play around with pH or any water parameters for that matter, as I don't believe in playing or manipulating the water parameter, as this will makes the water parameters unstable.

The most effective way to use foster parents is to use them when they are in "breeding mode" as this will arose their maternal instinct to guard and carry the fries. Of course, you must use foster parents that have at least carried their fries once before.

They are active at the age of between 1-2 years, above 2 years usually the amount of fries that hatched and are healthy can be quite low. I've used a Discus that was 5 years old for breeding and the result was not very satisfactorily.

Yes, I feed the pairs beefheart mix with vitamins to increase their body stamina and also to increase their immune system. Because after their "milking" period discus are very vulnerable immune wise and we have to take care of this by feeding them the best quality of food and vitamins, and of course plenty of fresh water.

I don't prepare anything special, the only thing I make sure is they have clean good fresh water to start out with, and I don't put salts in breeding tanks as this will kill the eggs.

I've come across

* White poos - This can be treated by using Metro.

* Fungus - This can be treated by using a medication that is called Blitz Ich.

* Velvet - I use a product called Copper Aid. When I use Copper Aid I use less than the recommened dosage as Copper is quite harmful to Discus if they are under stress.

I changed 50% of the water daily.