The Discus: An Owner's Guide to a Happy Healthy Fish (Happy Healthy Pet) [Hardcover]

Mic Hargrove (Author), Maddy Hargrove (Author), David Brown (Author)

Book Description

Series: Happy Healthy Pet | Publication Date: December 14, 1999

Written by tropical fish experts with over 30 years experience, The Discus includes all the information a new fish keeper needs to begin this exciting hobby: how to select a tank; proper water conditions; nutrition; and breeding your own beautiful fish. Like all the titles in the Owner's Guide series, The Discus is filled with info-packed sidebars and striking color photos. This book helps make keeping Discus a fun and rewarding experience for the hobbyist.

Editorial Reviews

From the Back Cover

At last, a book for the beginning Discus-keeper with everything you need to know about caring for the exotic Discus. The Discus: An Owner's Guide to a Happy Healthy Fish will answer all of your questions about successful Discus care—from selecting the right tank to breeding your own beautiful fish. Proper water conditions, good nutrition and how to keep your fish in the best of health are discussed in full. Written by experienced keepers of tropical fish, The Discus: An Owner's Guide to a Happy Healthy Fish includes insight into Discus behaviors that will make keeping Discus all the more fun, With info-packed sidebars and striking color photos, this is the Discus book that hobbyists will most enjoy.

About the Author

MIC and MADDY HARGROVE have over 30 years experience in all aspects of aquarium fish-keeping. They are the authors of The Betta: An Owner's Guide to a Happy Healthy Fish and contribute to many magazines about the hobby. DAVID BROWN is a longtime fish breeder and writer.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 125 pages
• Publisher: Howell Book House; 1 edition (December 14, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1582451125
• ISBN-13: 978-1582451121
• Product Dimensions: 8.5 x 5.4 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 10.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #541,958 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

27 of 27 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Absolutely Terrible, July 9, 2001

By 

Kevin Thurston (Parker, CO USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Discus: An Owner's Guide to a Happy Healthy Fish (Happy Healthy Pet) (Hardcover)

This book is a complete waste of money. I'd give it a negative number of stars if I could. What's so bad about it then? It is simply a beginners guide to aquarium keeping (and not a very good one at that) with a few mentions of discus thrown in to make it sound as if it is a discus book.

The photographs are OK as far as photography goes, but most of the fish pictured are poor specimens including the malformed discus pictured on the cover. Many of the photos are re-used in different parts of the book, occasionally in reverse as if there was an attempt to disguise the fact that the pictures were being re-used. The captions have nothing to do with the photos. There is a picture of a fish with holes in it's head and another of a fish with early stages of fin rot, but neither of these pictures are used in the section on diseases and the captions do not point out these defects. There is no identification of the strains being pictured and virtually no photos of wild specimens to help in identifying the 2 species and 5 subspecies that are briefly described in the text.

There is a section on the history of the discus, but important names such as Jack Wattley, Carrol Friswold, and Gene Wolfsheimer are conspicuous by their absence.

A lot of the information is redundant and contradictory. For example on page 39 we find "One way to estimate which size heater your aquarium will need is to allow 5 watts per gallon. For example, a 55-gallon aquarium would need a heater that is at least 275 watts". Meanwhile, on page 54 we read "A heater should supply 2 watts per gallon. So, a 55-gallon aquarium would need at least a 110-watt heater". Now which do think the authors would have you use? Of course they also don't mention that nobody actually manufactures heaters of those wattages (they can readily be found in 25, 50, 75, 100, 125, 150, 200, 250 and 300 watts).

On the whole, this is one of those books that seems to regurgitate a bunch of stuff that has become "standard knowledge" in the aquarium hobby, without really knowing why these things have become so (or the science behind it). On page 80 in a side box on bare tank set-ups, we are admonished that these are "less cozy for your fish", whatever that is supposed to mean. I doubt that "coziness" is anything we can measure or the fish can give us feedback on in the same way that they behave if their water is too warm.

On page 47 there is an extremely poor and misleading diagram of the nitrogen cyle. It implies that the major source of ammonia in the aquarium is the fungal and bacterial decomposition of fish "wastes" (feces?). The major source of ammonia is: it is directly exhaled into the water from fishes gills. There is also no mention of the relationship of pH to ammonia ionization, which is critical to be aware of in the low pH of a discus tank, particularly with regards to water changes and the usually accompanying rise in pH.

There are a lot of other points I could raise, but time constraints prevent me. In summary, this book is a complete waste of money. Just about any book would be better, but if price is a concern the T. Giovanetti book is far better in this price range. I haven't seen M. Sweeney's discus book, but I have seen other things she has written and although I don't really care for her, even her book has got to be better than this one. Even better, spend a little extra and get something by B. Degen, J. Wattley, or J. Quarles. With the price of discus being what it is, if you can afford to keep them, you can afford one of the better books.

33 of 35 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars So easy, even a beginner can do it!, May 12, 2000

By 

William Amely (United States of America(New York)) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Discus: An Owner's Guide to a Happy Healthy Fish (Happy Healthy Pet) (Hardcover)

I recently had the pleasure of purchasing, and reading, "The Discus:An owner's guide to a Happy Healthy fish." This book is a great source of information for beginning hobbysts who would like to try their hand at breeding these gorgeous fish from South America. The Authors(Mic & Maddy Hargrove and David Brown) wrote this book in an effort to show that these fish are easy to work with when you provide them the proper conditions needed for them to thrive in the home aquarium. It is very thorough, providing the reader with the origin of the Discus, how they were first brought to the U.S., the first attempts made in breeding them, the first color varieties available to hobbysts, the behavioral characteristics of Discus, etc. They go through all the steps necessary in keeping and breeding them, from suitable tankmates to tank size, to water conditions, proper diet, providing plants to help them feel secure,the type of equipment available, etc. The authors walk you through all the steps necessary to help the beginner become a capable Discus keeper and breeder. Even advance hobbysts will find this book to be a handy reference guideand make it part of their tropical fish library. If the information contained in this book alone doesn't convince you buy it, the colorful and attractive pictures of the Discus contained in it make this a 'must buy' book.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Absolute Rubbish, June 5, 2006

By 

Sanju (Jamshedpur, India) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Discus: An Owner's Guide to a Happy Healthy Fish (Happy Healthy Pet) (Hardcover)

I bought this book thinking I will get more knowledge about Discus keeping .But after going through the book I changed my opinion and think buying this book was absolute waste of money and time. Information given in the book is too general for any aquarium fish and not for Discus fish in particular. Not worth spending you precious money and time.