somebody wanna help me understand why not to use carbon to filter te water in my discus tank

It's not that you can't use it...it won't hurt anything...but it won't help much either. Carbon is only effective for a short period of time and then needs to be replaced. It is expensive and not required for a clean tank. Carbon is often times only used as a filter media when a specific additive to a tank needs to be removed. Such as removing meds after a treatment.

My question is, did someone tell you not to?
I run it in my heavily planted tank and I can tell when it is time to change it. To me it makes a difference. Or maybe it's just my imagination. I clean my tank once weekly, twice if i'm bored. I change my canister filters every month. It usually cost me about $10 to change it out.

That's real good information WYite! I didn't know there was a difference in carbon. I'm gonna look for a better brand. I usually just get the tub of carbon they sale at Wal-Mart. I do have to rinse it real well before putting it in my filter. It's about $7 a tub and I have to use 1 and 1/4 tubs for my two filters.

Here is an article I wrote on carbon some time ago...I am sure you will have a better understanding and decide if it is suitable for you after reading.

Carbon Article

Nothing eats cyanobacteria? Someone should tell my goldfish that.

its not that i was tolod not too, just that i read not to without an explination in another forum. i cant get a moderator from simply discus to activate my account there but thats where i saw it

I have one comet, that earned the title Survivor. Managed a good two weeks in with the RTC and didn't get eaten.

I tossed it in the feeder guppy tank, (since I'm out of guppies at the moment) that had the purple algae, and the next morning a good bunch of it was gone. I'm not sure if that's normal for goldies, but there ya go.

I don't have experience with Discus, so I can't answer your original question. I'm one of those who doesn't use carbon and have never had a problem due to not using it. I do keep it around just in case the tank gets polluted or I have added meds and need to remove any traces left after treatment.

Good info Wyite. I guess the other reasons I don't use carbon is I don't have issues with heavy metals in my water, I change water frequently enough that tanins aren't an issue and I'm cheap...lol.

I would think (depending on the metals) that a planted tank would prefer not to have the metals removed. If you add ferts that contain heavy metals they will be removed from the water column by the carbon. Maybe I'm thinking about it wrong but aren't most micro-nutrients heavy metals? I understand that plants need carbon in order to grow but plants get carbon from CO2 gas not from solid forms of carbon. At least that's how I understand it.

Carbon will take clean water and make it crystal clear but I have a hard time seeing the difference myself.

Humm thats the first time I have heard of not using carbon with discus. I dont use carbon simply because you dont need to it in your filters unless removing meds and I use conditioners that remove heavy metals.