DISCUS
Discus as the king of freshwater fish attract many people to maintain. In addition to shapes, colors, and patterns of interest, the prices become expensive one to maintain traction.
o get a good discus surely must get a good seed. Therefore hobies especially a beginner should be smart in selecting fish.
Following tips for choosing a good discus, among others;
1. The bright color, tunicate or not removing the excessive mucus. Skin color or a shiny black indicates conditions that are not healthy discus. The black vertical bar that is very blatant / explicit discus marks in the heavy stress conditions. The number of this line varies according to the variants of fish. Usually amounted to between 7-18 bar.
This bar does not function to determine a sick discus, but the discus as a result of upset conditions, or environmental conditions that are not suitable for the discus. Many types of stress that indicates discus-bar with its clear.
2. Scale on the fish that does not exfoliate and clean, not slimy and white spotted too many. Fin fish should look clean and complete. Fin is torn, damaged, moldy denotes not healthy fish. Fin disability that is not balanced and will create a rounded shape and beautiful discus seen.
3. Eye color is clear, not white spotted or tunicate. Eyeball that does not come out too light, such as radial tires. So-called pop-eye because of the eye condition that ugly water, and fish with intestinal bacteria. The size of the fish is too big on the small fish indicates hampered growth. Besides the black eye can be caused by internal diseases, and too long exposed to contamination of drugs in the long-term
4. Discus fish body form of the ideal, not visible from the lean thickness forehead discus. Discus physical disability that is not usually visible from the front where the left and right looks the same. Mouth or other body part does not have anything more to the left or right.
5. How the rhythmic breathing regularly, where the two gill opening and closing the same. Close gill cover gill arches, not short and do not gape open. Must also be a very quick breath, which can be caused by a lack of oxygen occurs when the long term will damage the function of gill
6. Discus healthy, generally is not afraid of people who view it. Discus are usually good and healthy will soon come up with a fast, thought will be given food. Besides a healthy discus is generally not alone, but with his friends.
7. Generally, a healthy discus, swimming style of quiet, choked-not stagnant. Discus like to scrape the body parts to equipment or surrounding objects, generally fell ill parasites. This may be because the itchiness is caused due to tick bites or fungus / bacteria on the skin and gill. Discus are generally healthy with a calm swim, under the front of the fin so that the stomach was revealed at the time visible doughtily swimming (pectoral fin).
8. Do not be gullible to the color. Red burn on the color of the eyes and striking, especially in the discus small & young people (between 2-3 inches), not a guarantee to get a good discus. At this time there are some people who use hormones to force the discharge colors of fish, which aims to facilitate sales and increase the attractiveness of the fish. This color will not survive long (more than 2 weeks - 1 month).
9. Pattern fish usually occur 2 inches to start up and staged. Be careful when buying discus pattern that has been out since the size of a small, likely because of the hormone to remove the pattern is to look beautiful. Is a reasonable pattern of out-half or less only on the size of 2 inches, but sometimes the quality of the discus to a low result does not leave his complexion is perfect until a full body. Try buy discus child sized up to 2 inches.
In addition to the above tips, then the most important adaptation is done slowly after arriving at home and do the quarantine at any fish purchased.

African Lake Cichlids Malawi
by Michael Logan

Lake Malawi is part of the East African Rift valley system (meaning it lies in the East African rift caused by the African tectonic plate splitting in two) and is located in southern Africa. It is the ninth largest lake in the world and the third largest in Africa with a surface area around 29,600 km. It is situated between the countries of Malawi, Tanzania, and Mozambique. The lake is often called Lake Nyssa as there is still a debate between bordering countries. Lake Malawi consists of a single large basin that is approximately 506 km long and 75 km wide at the widest point. The lake's maximum depth is 700 m and it has a mean depth of around 292 m. Lake Malawi is unusual because it does not have tides or currents.

The lake is fairly warm with a deep level temperature of around 72o and with a surface temperature of 75 - 84o. The reason for the 9o F fluctuation in temperature is that Lake Malawi lies far enough south of the equator to experience definite seasonal variations in temperature. The pH ranges from 7.7 - 8.6, the gH ranges from 4-6 dH, and the kH ranges from 6-8 dH.

There are several main cichlid habitats within the lake. The first is the sandy shoreline that makes up about 70% of the coast. Some plants live in this area, but not many. Haps and peacocks use this as their habitat. The second area is the rocky shoreline that makes up the remaining 30% of the coast. Here there is no vegetation and rocks are piled on top of each other. The rocky areas tend to be where the shores have a steep drop off. Mbunas make this their habitat (hence their name which means "rock-dweller"). The third area is the river mouths and area close to shore that are highly vegetated. These areas tend to be shallow and can also be fairly muddy. Lastly, the deep water zones that go from 30 m to 250 m deep are inhabited by some of the larger predatory cichlids.