That is really interesting, I never knew that the real issue is the germs and not hypersensitivity to ph and hardness.
I have a tank being prepared for blackwater fish, I am probably going to put chocolate gouramis in it (do you think they have the same issues, sensitivity to germs more than sensitivity to water conditions?).
I have a filter with peat in it, is there any reason not to just leave peat in a filter and let that run constantly? (and periodically replace the peat as it dissolves)
I will also follow the standard method of prefiltering the r/o/ water with peat before I use it for water changes. But in the main tank is it an ok idea to just have a peat filter running all the time?
The tank is a Red Sea Max 35, intended as a coral tank but I am not using its strong filtration, just its glass cage and lighting. It has stacks of driftwood and a layer of floating water sprite, a filter with peat and a sponge filter and the temperature around 80 degrees.
I wonder how many chocolate gouramis (probably selatanensis) need to be kept to distribute the aggression, I’ve seen 15 gallon tanks with about 4 and they looked ok, but I’ve heard they will kill each other also. And finally, is there much difference in keeping chocolate gouramis than licorice gouramis, as far as the requirement for germ free acid water? Since they are both from the same or similar habitats, is it very similar the requirements they have?
I’ve read chocolate gouramis are really sensitive to disease, I wonder if this is different than licorice gouramis tendencies.
This is a long, not that concise post, sorry about that. But the information you mentioned about why these fish need the conditions they need is really fascinating.