Bickal's Breeding Program

[GregBickal]

The earthquake was a tragedy indeed. The Japanese are a strong people, I know they will rebuild and be even better. I think the Japanese bore the cost of the losses.

I also lost a nice female Kujaku that Fujio picked out for me at Kaneko. Picture attached. Mark Bodycott said he would refund my money or credit it towards future purchases. I had him hold it and hopefully he will be able to go back and get me more koi next time he visits.

I had origionally bought 5 females (Kujaku, Asagi, Platinum Ogon, Doitsu Ochiba, Sorgoi) and 7 males (2 kohaku, 2 Shiro Utsuri, 2 Yamabuki, 1 Chagoi). Due to a mixup from the earthquake, the Platinum Ogon I got was a male. So I only ended up with 2 females. The Soragoi and the Doitsu Ochiba.

Breeding Set #1
2 Shiro Utsuri's males to the Female Showa I already own.

Breeding Set #2
2 Kohaku males to the Female Soragoi

Breeding Set #3
Some of my mutt doitsu males to the female Dotisu Ochiba

Breeding Set #4
One of the Yamabuki's is looking like it might turn out to be female, so I am hopeful. If it does, then I am going to breed it to the male yamabuki and the Male Platinum Ogon.

[Jackie Ramo]

Greg, can you post pictures of the breeding pairs? and maybe talk about why you chose those pairs and what you hope the fry will be like.

[luke frisbee]

Greg,
Some nice decisions there....I would question breeding the the platinum with the yamabuki...you'll get too many washed out yellow koi and alot of platinums that get yellow when you don't want them to.
Platinum to a Gosanke could be good.

[Ron C]

Luke could you please post the projected outcomes of breeding different types of Koi? I am very curious

[luke frisbee]

Rancid,
i got a rudimentary edjumacation on what will give you what..but there are too many to list.
The best one is breeding a Kohaku to a soragoi will get you Ochiba sigure.... I would STRONGLY suggest you 9and everyone else) get brady's "Koifixx" DVD subscription..THAT is the man that knows what will get you what...and his DVD is going to educate quite a bit, and keep me abreast of what is going on in the rest of the koiworld.

[Terri]

I second that Luke, I think Brady's DVD will be something eveyone will want/should have. Luke, even with your rudimentary edjumacation I think we would all like to hear what you have learned(maybe in new thread).

Greg I think Luke's right, yama's to purchina will get you pale colourings...(cream ogons?) - our spawn last year had a male yamabuki mixed in with showa and sanke and soragoi... where some interesting colour variations. What would the chances be of using the yamabuki with a showa... maybe ki-utsuri in the mix?

Shame about you kujaku. I would like to see pics of your parent sets too.

[Ron C]

I guess I am going to have to order it, but it is so pricey. I'm not doubting that it is worth it, just bucks are really tight right now.

[Jackie Ramo]

Perhaps there is a birthday or anniversary coming up... a nice printout of the website lying around may just do it for you. Doesn't work for me, but women are more open to suggestions !rofl

[luke frisbee]

yeah I do not get any of the mags, except the one that comes with being a ZNA member. I am CHEAP.
...but this thing will be like getting a koi movie every couple of months for 10 bucks...that's the way I look at it....and Brady is friggin smart, Spooky Smart. And he has a background in TV production or something, so this won't be pics of koi through wobbly water and glare.
they'll be worth looking at for the rest of your life.

[luke frisbee]

AND WAIT!
I know a little about what bred to what gets what. But I bet i don't know as much as terri and ian. I do know where to go and ask. But I ain't bother them kind of people unless i really need to know.
I think brady will ahve an article on such things....when i visited his booth at CFKS he mentioned something about all the variation he gets when crossing certain varieties. I've heard other people saying they get a broader spectrum than they were supposed to from crossing their scrubs..and someone (maybe brady i am confused on sources quite frequently) crossed genuwine japanese gosanke to genuwine japanese gosnake and got everything under the sun.

[GregBickal]

Ok guys, I created a webpage for my 2005 breeding plans. Female koi is on top :roll: I can make adjustments as you guys make recommendations.http://bickal.home.mchsi.com/koi2004/PAIRS.HTM

Also, if you want to see the koi that I have available to breed with (both domestic and Japanese), go here: http://bickal.home.mchsi.com/koi2004/index.htm

I would prefer not to intermix my mutt domestic stock and Japanese koi, as I would like to have a pure japanese lineage. But, given the limited Japanese koi that I have to work with...

It also might be possible to re-use males with other females. But logistically that might pose some problems.

Ok, so for the Yamabuki. I would like to get pure Yamabuki, and also Lemon Harawaki. So how do I get the Lemon Harawaki ?

[Jackie Ramo]

Greg, the sites don't say which are males, we know which are females, nor does it say imported or domestic.... the pics don't click either.. nag nag anag !strut

[Jackie Ramo]

Bump for Bickal!!!! :wave:

[GregBickal]

Will Male Shiro Utsuri to Female Red Ogon give me Hi Utsuri ?
Will Male Shiro Utsuri to Female Yamabuki give me Ki Utsuri ?
Will Male Kohaku to Female White Masbuba give me Kujaku ?

[Swamprat]

Female utsuri X traditional showa...\
Female kigoi/doits yama X male shiro./
Kujaku = male goshiki X platinum or (better) kikusui/yamato...

Got spots ?


:lol:

[Busy B]

Still speaking in tongues huh Doug? :grin:

[Jackie Ramo]

I thought his Japanese had improved :D

[GregBickal]

Male ____ + Female _____ = _______

That format would be most helpful. I looked up a picture of kikusui and thats a doitsu kohaku (sort of). Red is different I guess.

Well, Mark is going back to Japan April 1st. Ive still got some credit to buy some koi. I was thinking instead of getting a Kujaku female to get a white Matsuba female and breed that with my Male Kohakus. I already have a platinum ogon from Chogoru, but in retrospect, the Matsuba probably would have been the better purchase for breeding combinations.

Given that im having problems with the ochiba (dont count your chickens before they are hatched), I have removed it as a possible spawn for this year. Updated the plan to now look like this: http://home.mchsi.com/~bickal/koi2004/PAIRS.HTM

Of course I guess I could always just let them flock spawn and say "who cares" what combination made what as long as I get some hot looking koi. :frisbee:

Naaaahhhhhhh....

[GregBickal]

This domestic female Orange Ogon is 24" and always produces alot of eggs. Would I get some Hi Utsuri if I put the Shiro Utsuri Males with her ?
http://home.mchsi.com/~bickal/koi2004/pb140130.jpg

[Terri]

Male ____ + Female _____ = _______ Greg, out of all the possible combinations you will find each will throw lots of different varities...very few varieties breed true..., it's the culling that's important in getting what you want.

If you want utsuri use showa and utsuri, that's your best bet. Even showa to showa will produce a cetain amount of utsuri... if you want some kin utsuri use one of those yamabuki.

What you need to ask about this female "ogon"(is she metalic?) is what her past spawns have produced... is she a good breeder? Do the fry she throws have good colour and body confirmation... good growth?

I think it's a good idea that you've taken the Ochiba out of the running this year.

[Dayleen]

Greg, breed that Platinum Ogon with your Kohaku and see what kind of Kikusui you get

[luke frisbee]

This domestic female Orange Ogon is 24" and always produces alot of eggs. Would I get some Hi Utsuri if I put the Shiro Utsuri Males with her ?
http://home.mchsi.com/~bickal/koi2004/pb140130.jpg

no...that Orenji needs to find a home....in a rose bed. Never breed, or allow THAT fish ( Questionable whether it can be called a koi.) to breed.
listen greg the best you can hope to do this year is 2 breedings. You admit that you have limited resources in EVERY LEVEL but insist on trying all these whacked out crosses.
breed your gosankes to each other. And have Mark get you another gosanke. You do not have room to play "guess what I spawned?". Or, "Is this a koi?"
Go Gosanke. (that is a period, stop the madness)

[Jackie Ramo]

Well we all know it isn't often that Luke makes sense but this advice is good IMO. Later you can breed domestic to import but since you have pure stock... so to speak... why not breed it. Heaven knows they will through off enough varieties without mixing them up at this point. It will also show you what kind of babies they make. A breeding pair are not necessarily prized for their own beauty but for the beauty they produce.

[GregBickal]

Dayleen: The platinum ogon and kohaku are both male :( I was suppost to get a female platinum, but there was a mixup due to the earthquake. :sad:

Terri: Yes, I was just thinking like 70% would be true. Mabye the % is lower.

Jackie: Pure Japanese would be preferred yes, and Im sure I should have enough eggs to give me plenty of koi to cull through.

Luke: Here are some pictures of my breeding efforts to date with this particular line of ogon. First picture is my very first koi (the grandmother), second picture is the mother, and the last 2 pictures are the children. Do you see an improvement ? This ogon has bekko in the woodpile, so black spots may or may not come up. Notice the grandmother has more of a pepper look to her. Mother has more refined larger spots.

By the way, I have sold the grandmother (even tho it was my first $5 koi from wal mart). I will also be selling the mother as the daughters get old enough to replace her.

[luke frisbee]

Pickle boy,
i have been a bad boy I have publically told you that your koi suck and the majority of your thoughts are not logical, and you don't have a clue ...the last koi is a sanke. AND NOONE Is proud when they post a pic of a third rate bekko. :frisbee: :frisbee: (btw this emoticon is named for me)
What you have is enthusiasm and energy...what the Saint has is Money and ego.......both of you refuse to listen and can't see what the heck you are doing and what you can do.
CHILL.
Go to newt's and beg KGB to be your sansai(sp), Do what he saids to do. DO NOT DO WHAT YOU THINK IS RIGHT. And remember to formally thank me in the Fall...when you have something besides those Butt ugly koi that you should have been ashamed to post.
If you do as I say, AND KGB will be willing to offer his advice (that you damn sure better take down to the finest detail) you will be using the crap you posted to fertilize the sunflowers.
greg you wasted a trip to japan...yeah right...you wasted a Winter by not conditioning the koi you SHOULD be breeding by giving them proper space without tankmates, and if you don't pull your head out of the toilet bowl you will waste an entire season.
Only breed ONLY two Only females Only this Only Spring. And Only breed Only Gosanke Only that Only you Only got Only from Only Japan.

[GregBickal]

Lukie, I have already been talking to KGB :D . The last koi is an Aka Bekko (so said Tom Graham from koi USA magazine). Yes, they are 3rd rate BECAUSE IM BREEDING WITH MUTTS. :frisbee: That Aka Bekko came from a spawning of one of my Shiro Bekko Males and my Orengi Ogon female. Im not ashamed to post pictures of any koi I own or have breed. They were the best I had at the time. Mabye you better read Koi2Kichi and see some of the mutts that were the first koi in the Japanese koi shows. Everyone makes progress, just give them time. Now that I have some good quality koi, I will be producing better koi than I have been, no matter if its a pure Japanese mix or a half and half.

I didn't waste ANYTHING, by all rights, I shouldnt even be breeding those 2 year old females until they hit 4. (see that is advice that someone gave me, that im trying to listen to, yet still be able to have a spawning for this year) Thats why I was considering using a domestic female for this year to allow the Japanese koi to develop properly for a few more years. As for using the males, it would be better if they were 3, but they should have enough "juice" at 2 to get the job done. Remember, this is Iowa weather, its a little different from your all warm all the time weather. BTW, my koi will have a full 2 months outside before they spawn in early June. Compare that to the koi that stayed outside all winter, and the koi kept indoors have a HUGE advantage.

What you have is enthusiasm and energy...what the Saint has is Money and ego
And what do you have ;)

[luke frisbee]

I got a good veiw and an honest piehole.
Copy KGB's discipline, you can't play games.
and with the white in those fins it is NOT a Bekko, someone was stroking you.
And breeding crap to decent koi will get you mostly crap. breeding good koi to good koi will get you about 10x as amny good fish and 20x as many tategoi.
Throw your crap into the "sale vat".
And even breeding just "high-quality" koi to each other still may not give great results....
and as to your koi being as good as were shown 30 yrs ago...well show up at the next Nascar event with a '74 monte carlo and see what the Head mechanics of the other crews think of your "attempt".
You do not have to follow in their footsteps...so in ten more years are you going to be what? ..only 15 yrs behind the quality of what is being produced....
Mimic TODAY'S Breeders, not the rice farmers from 30 yrs back.

I hate seeing you waste (yes waste in comparison to what you could be doing/producing) your energy. get a grip. Two breedings of quality Gosanke. and hell if you can't produce a crop from them this year suck it up and do not breed anything. Sell your crapagoi and give your jap koi the best environment for growth and health, and prepare ponds for next year.

[luke frisbee]

two other things....
first never post one damn pic from 4 progressive generations and make a statement about how 20,000 eggs turned out....Let me take four examples form those generations and i could show a much worse decline in the quality of those pairings.

and pickle, breeders breed the best koi they can get their hands on...not the best crap they have made.
Pride goeth.....

[luke frisbee]

Oh and I didn't say consult with KGB...I said do every dam thing he saids do....you consistently gather information from multiple sources and then accept whatever info supports what the hell you wanted to do in the first place.
You need to stop and accept that you can't do what you want and get the results you want. You are limited.

[GregBickal]

As for the Aka bekko, you may want to look at the Koi identification poster again. Aka Bekko has a white belly and white pecs. Mine does have some sumi on the pecs, so you want to call it a poor excuse for a Sanke. Thats fine with me.
http://australiankoiassoc.bizland.com/VarietiesBekko.chtml

[luke frisbee]

Pickle...have bothered to look at the dorsal fin of that "Bekko"...and going to an "australian" site for koi info? Do you get your Rugby Info from a Japanese Site? :lol:

Now back to reality. YOU DO NOT HAVE THE RESOURCES TO RECREATE THE WHEEL. Get some great koi (four or five of them) and breed two spawns.
the reason I suggested Gosanke is because they have been around longer and breed truer. if you want a "mixture" then play with the newer varieties...but don't expect to have a koi you can show. you will be able to sell the heck outta your purty fishes locally though..there again, get some real breeders not crapagoi.

[GregBickal]

Just used the austrailian web site because it was the first one I found with a picture. Jeez dude instead of being one of these :twisted: try being one of these !dude

Fine, we will ask the experts...
http://members4.boardhost.com/koimag/msg/99512.html

My breeding goals are not to compete in shows. My breeding goals are to provide my local pond people with cheap "Purty" koi. A tanke full of gosanke doesnt sell to well around here. People want variety.

If I can get ahold of mud pond space, mabye breeding show koi could be in my future, but not for right now. !bonk

[GregBickal]

Aka Sanke, see, where both right !rofl

[luke frisbee]

No we are not BOTH right !rofl

I am right (as most always...ask the saint).

OH! you want purty fish...skip gosanke all together; get some metallic yellow ginrin Longfins turn em loose and whatch the bunch of glittery crap you get..... even those tightwads up there will pay you 3x what you are asking for Picklegoi

[Swamprat]

My breeding goals are not to compete in shows. My breeding goals are to provide my local pond people with cheap "Purty" koi. A tanke full of gosanke doesnt sell to well around here. People want variety.

Variety.

In that case I got a number for ya.
$23 a lb for koi out of Arkansas.
Don't waste the effort breeding and culling and putting the stress on your Jap fish.

. Buy'em and fly'em.
Just because yer neighbors are B00Bz ( most of mine are too) doesn't mean you'd cross a nice $2500 Imported Shepherd to a pit bull so the inbreds could hav'em a GitDown DeerRapinDog...or do it ?

Put out the effort with good fish. The internet will let you move your better tosai with ease.
Look at what Kieffer is doing in Tampa ( kggt )

Get the neighbors some 8-10 inch imported Bickalgoi ( from Arkansas) and don't forgit the free Gintzu knife
!rofl

[luke frisbee]

Whew, and I thought I was tough.
I already tried to get him to sweet talk KGB (and follow EVERY damn thing KGB tells him to do), But he likes to dream :lol:

[Ian]

If I was you Greg I would pair up the ones you feel you want to. The spin off of any spawn can produce nice koi. I'm simple and find most koi attractive but find quality and a nice Show pattern to be a goal. You have to start somewhere and what you have will do. The learning that will be done at each and every spawn especially at your first attempts to pair are important as you up the anti with better stock. I think the last thing you want to do is try on your best koi. There is a lot of learning to do to ensure the safety of the koi and how to handle and cull the fry. The fact that you just got your new Japanese koi and they need a good summer to love you. Leave the girls out of your plans this year but the boys will always be ready :grin:
I never comment on what you can get out of a pairing because it is a crap shoot every time. Something about 30,000 to 40,000 fry out of a pairing that can throw you a curve ball. Showa and utsuri you keep all the black fry now thats as easy as it gets. Other pairings you need to know what the yellow ones, clear ones are as fry and what the develope to be. The idea is knowing what the fry look like from a pairing and what they grow to be. Unless you know what the fry look like from the pairing you have done, the culling will be easy and I would figure that will take at least five years to determine. Have fun with it and get serious later.

[Tom C]

Greg if you do mix breeds, I do think you will get koi like these.

http://backyardpuddle.com/forum/attachment.php?attachmentid=350

[GregBickal]

Well, I made some progress on the breeder ponds this weekend. Got to borrow my neighbors skid loader for the very first time !dude Oh yeah, gotta love those hand controls. Isn't my little helper cute :-P

[GregBickal]

Here is the hole I wound up with. 18' wide by 34' long.

[GregBickal]

Dont worry, I have plenty of rubber for the job :wink: My neigbhor is a roofer, I get used rubber all the time. Its free, and it works great for ponds. The first roll is a 18x21, second roll 16x20. Other rolls are like 14x15. I'll end up building 2 large pools, with filter chambers in-between.

[GregBickal]

Heres the plan. A little bigger than I had planned on, but hey, didnt expect to have the skid loader to dig it so large. Im flexible :grin:

Since I only have peices of liner, I will build the middle section out of green treated wood. Then line with rubber.

[Jackie Ramo]

Big plans Greg. Good job you have a helper. Not to mention a neighbour we'd all like to know.. :)

[GregBickal]

And all I had to do is bribe my neighbor with is a few bicklegoi for his pond and a six pack of beer :grin: My pond plans get even bigger every time I get a free piece of rubber and free access to a machine.

Now if I knew a way to find free cement blocks :wink: opps I know that trick already, they dont use them around here however :grin:

[Swamprat]

And all I had to do is bribe my neighbor with is a few bicklegoi for his pond and a six pack of beer :grin: My pond plans get even bigger every time I get a free piece of rubber and free access to a machine.

Now if I knew a way to find free cement blocks :wink: opps I know that trick already, they dont use them around here however :grin:
Did you get the beer at a discounted price ? :roll:

[Busy B]

I still see lawn there...it's gotta go :smile:

The 3 part section in the middle is for the filter chamber? Green wood? Wouldn't that be toxic?

Your helper is adorable!

[GregBickal]

I'm back. Busy 3 day weekend. Had about 8 customers stopping in to buy koi.

Saturday around lunchtime, water temp in the outside matched my basement pond (63F), so I took the Sanke and Showa outside. Put my other domestic koi in the lower pond.

By late Sunday afternoon, temps were up enough that I could take the rest of my Japansese koi outside. I decided just to throw them all in together for this year. I know I know, but I am more concerned with keeping them healthy.

Checked the koi about 10pm Sunday night before going to bed.....
WE HAVE SPAWNING FOLKS !!

What the heck guys ? Your not suppost to spawn until late MAY. Definetly got caught with my pants down. Spawning ropes are already in the pond, so I let them go at it. Checked them around 2am monday and they were still going strong. Checked them again 6am still going strong. Kept spawning till 10am. WHO HOOH 12 hours straight. These Japanese koi got some Stamina.

Removed all the eggs to kiddy pools while I frantically constructed my hatching pond. Wouldnt you know it, the domestic koi in the lower pond started spawning also. Grabbed my Large orange ogon, and put her up with the Japanese males. This actually helped the Showa female out alot and gave her a break. The males went at the ogon until 4pm in the afternoon.

Collected those eggs and put them in a separate pool.

Here's some pics

[GregBickal]

Some more pictures. One of the Shiro Utsuri went over the waterfall and down the stream. Found him in the evening and returned him to the big pond. Gotta watch him for the next few days for signs of infection.

[GregBickal]

While the fish were spawning I worked frantically to get the new spawning pools finished.. Finally started filling it with water around 4pm. Half full around 8pm. Transfered all of the Japanese eggs to it.

[Terri]

!wow! You've got your work cut out for ya ... fun fun! LOL Good luck Greg :grin:

[Jackie Ramo]

Greg! This is a family site, don't be posting your sex pictures here :lol: :lol:


Truly they all look great and I bet are sure happy in their new space.

Will be interesting to track this group of fry and see how they turn out, especially since you had the luck to be able to set up a separate tank for the 'domestic' offspring.

[Terri]

What's the temp in the new hatching ponds? I wanna see some fry .. :grin:

[GregBickal]

I'll take a temp reading when I get home tonight. The 7 day forcast has me a little concerned. Specially for friday !wow! Well, the nightime lows dont look good at all this week. Could see water temps in the low 60's.

[GregBickal]

This is as close as your gonna get to fry for today :grin: I'll try to get some under the microscope and get some development pictures. Mabye Luke can start culling from Microscope photos of koi in the eggs. :frisbee:

[GregBickal]

Ive started a spawning blog on my website, go to http://www.bickal.com/ and click on "Spawning"

[Terri]

!rofl at quote:Mabye Luke can start culling from Microscope photos of koi in the eggs.
I bet he will ...

Very cool Greg :grin:

[GregBickal]

He'll say "pickle, your eggs are too small, your not giving them enough ....." :lol:

[Jackie Ramo]

:lol: :lol: You are probably right!!!

[luke frisbee]

No Pickle,
I'm thinking you done good. You'll need some luck...we all do....

But I do not cull anything till I have to....I love seeing what the culls turn into.

[GregBickal]

Well, my luck isnt looking to good today. The water temps last night were 70F. The nightime air temp was lower 40F. Water temp this morning was 58F. :( :( :( Dang it, probably lost the whole batch.

Large koi arent very happy either. 12 degree change in 12hours does not make for happy koi....

Isnt Iowa fun.

[Jackie Ramo]

Did you cover them? You never know some might make it. The season is just starting do you think they will spawn again?

[GregBickal]

Nope, didn't cover them. My fault. I was to busy last night at the Fluke Party (http://backyardpuddle.com/forum/showthread.php?t=360). Didnt get home till 7pm, then had to spend some quality time with my daughter, then had to do a 10% water change on the tank in the basement, and a 10% water change on the Ochiba tank. Then eat dinner.

Dang, where are my priorities.... !bonk

They might spawn again, but in order to get a pure spawning I would have to remove them to somewhere.

[Jackie Ramo]

I hear you. Sounds like home actually. Always something cropping up to interfer with ones hobbies.

[GregBickal]

Im starting to wonder what it is about this hobby that I actually enjoy.

[Terri]

You're kidding Greg!? This hobby we all have thrown ourselves into is ever changing, keeps us interested and on our toes.. it's not "always" fun but you're always learning :grin:

[GregBickal]

Hey its not like I havent filled in breeding ponds before and given up. Here are the ponds I used to have (same spot as the new ones).

How hard is basket weaving ? Lots of willows in my area, mabye that would be a good hobby instead.

[Jackie Ramo]

Trust me basket weaving is tough!!! and then the darn canes break :roll:

I doubt there are many folks who haven't thought of filling inthe pond at least once or twice. I have several times. But there it is, soon to give more enjoyment just as soon as I get the problems fixed...

[GregBickal]

Well, I checked some eggs under the microscope last night. Baby koi are alive still, and look like pretty close to hatching. Which is great news, because look at the revised 7 day forcast. Freezing weather saturday night. No amount of plastic is gonna keep this water warm enough...

Dangit. Enjoy the picture. I have live video of the fry moving inside the egg also.

http://home.mchsi.com/~bickalkoi/spawning/P4210017.JPG

[GregBickal]

The true expert behind my excellent microscope photography :grin:

[Terri]

Aww that is too cute, look at it's little eye :grin:

Sorry mother nature is not co-operating Greg... fingers crossed for you that the eggs/fry make it through the cold spell. It's been cold here too, 10C the past couple of days with drows to 0C at night.... where the hell is Spring anyways!!! :twisted:

[Terri]

You're assitant is doing a good job Greg :grin: Man she's too cute! Little koi keeper in training making daddy proud!

[Jackie Ramo]

Float stryofoam over the top and hope for the best. Or take some inside. Your beautiful assistant will help you. Can't wait for the grandson to get a bit older. Babies are ok but kids are fun.

[luke frisbee]

geez pickle,
DIY a heater...it doesn't matter how much energy it uses cuz it will only be needed for a week..... even a space heater hovering a foot over a small submersible pump with a massive filter so that none of the fry are sucked through the pump...and insulate it in a crazy way....like with trash bags floating on the surface....
The point is : Do something. Something outside the box...get it done.

[GregBickal]

I takes 2 watts per gallon to raise the water temprature. 3600 gallons, you do the math.

Moot point, their all gone.

Checked the eggs this weekend under the microscope and the fry are all dead inside the eggs.

Better luck next year :cry:

[Terri]

Greg, I'm so sorry... :(

[GregBickal]

Thanks Terri. Im pretty bummed out. I still have some domestic koi inside that I could spawn, but its not like seeing some high quality fry for a change. I'll learn my lesson for next year.

Just so Luke wont chew me out, at least I covered the eggs in plastic.

[Jackie Ramo]

That's too bad Greg. You didn't manage to scoop a tub full I guess.....

[Busy B]

Funny that you would freeze when everything is greening up so well...hope some make it for you!

[luke frisbee]

I don't know how but I'd kick your butt and let ya cry in my beer if I was there.
Wake the hell up.
fry are born in the beginning of Spring. They have some ability to deal with the cold. If you'd have thrown twenty buck worth of electrons at em most would have lived....or you could have blocked of a portion of the pond and slammed some heat to it....
I still gotta send you some of them manatee cabbages.

[luke frisbee]

I still believe there are fry alive in there...check again :mad:

[Swamprat]

If youda culled all of that spotted chit last year ya coulda raizzzed them indoors for a while.
Heating can certainly be expensive knowing your budget.
Hey !
Bought any more churches or other real estate lately ? !bonk

If ya want I'll sell ya some decent fish to resell Da Iowanians... inexpensive metallic tosai but good Niigata fish.
Minimum order = 3 grand... :wink:

[GregBickal]

So nice to have a board full of optimistic people, balances out my pessimisim and lame excuses. :grin:

I got more females inside. We'll try again in a few weeks.

BTW: Difference in temperature between the plastic covered pond and uncovered pond is only 2F... :-?

[Jackie Ramo]

Yeah yeah, but inside it was toasty and no heater needed, just a tub for a couple of days.

Aren't you glad to have so many people nag at you :smile: I'm with Luke though and think there should be some fry alive in there.

[GregBickal]

Weather looks like its gonna be this way for a solid 2 weeks. I suppose I could have put the ochiba out of its misery and used that tank for fry.

After the first night it was too late. 70F to 58F first night. Say "bye bye" eggyies.

[GregBickal]

Here's the 3 female koi that I have that are still inside that I could use for breeding stock. All are sold already, but could get a spawning out of them before they go :grin: Doistu Speckled Utsuri or Scaled Speckled Utsuri, take your pick, or Speckled Ogon. I know, I know, Luke will say, don't breed anything. But what a boring summer that would be without baby koi around. Plus practice makes perfect. Give me the ability to see how my new tanks perform.

So slap those 3 koi in with some of my Jap males and at least have something to watch grow...

http://bickal.home.mchsi.com/koi2004/pb140073.jpghttp://bickal.home.mchsi.com/koi2004/pb140067.jpghttp://bickal.home.mchsi.com/koi2004/pb140056.jpg

[Terri]

Sorry to say I would agree with Luke... but sicne you're going to do it anyways use the middle pic.

[luke frisbee]

Pickal,
ain't you goin to a show sometime...bring a 50 gallon tank and some really good aeration ( and prepare a fry pond before you go.)...wake up early and be at the tanks when the first guy goes in to check on them Saturday morning....more than likely they'll have a spawning.....ask em if you can scavenge the eggs. Get em home and spread em out.
with luck you could get a few hundred.
the reason the middle koi is your best shot...it has the fewest demeritys (crappy black spots).
You could also buy some non-culls from japan IF you know someone...one of their worthless wild spawns would be worth about 30x what you'd get from those bickal goi...both in knowledge and fish.

[GregBickal]

Okay, the middle one it is :grin: After the problems ive had as of late, I dont want to indroduce any outside fish to my system.

I got some goat poop brewing in my fry pond right now. With any luck I'll have some green water soon !! Ive also got a lead on some Chicken poop.

[Busy B]

Is the poo to help set up daphnia and all the other goodies for the fry to eat?

[GregBickal]

Yep, Im trying to get green water ON PURPOSE !wow!

[Jojopotato]

If I was just walking into this conversation as you are all talking about poo... I'd have to say EWWWWW...

However reading the full thread, I see theres a reason for this maddness... Enjoy!! I'll leave the breeding etc. to you.... :grin: :grin:

[luke frisbee]

Please Pickle, wake the hell up....why are you trying to go find chicken poop when it is exactly what you are going to breed?

[GregBickal]

Well, Luke was right, Luke is always right. I checked the big hatching pool last night (the one that I covered in plastic), and there are baby koi in there now. Ah, so glad Nature found a way.... WHOOO HOOOO. Hopefully you can tell by the picture how old they are. Looks like I have a few hundred at least.

I also took some live video under the microscope of a koi's fry heart beating. Its WAY cool. Their blood is so large, you can see the blood moving all over the body, even through the brain. WAY cool. Here's a link to the http://home.mchsi.com/~bickalkoi/P4270043.MOV (Koi Video) (warning its 4.5 meg)

[Ian]

Very cool pic! I,m glad some have survived for you this year. Good luck and keep us posted.
Are you going to spawn your domestic koi still?

[GregBickal]

No, I will not spawn my domestic koi now !!! That should make Luke happy. If I only have a few hundred fry that will be ok. In 7,000 gallons they should grow like weeds. :grin:

[Busy B]

Well Congrats Daddy! :grin: Glad some made it. Things are looking up!

[Jackie Ramo]

I can see Lukes head growing from here :lol: Glad some made it.

[Swamprat]

Shuddup, Listen to Whammo ( LA~Frisbee) and you'll be fine.

If ya wanna be a REAL koi guy.. nix the mullet .....

Focus Iowanian BooB..Focuus :wink:

I see the Great Unwashed have incorprated ZZZZZZZZZZZZ's into their forum :lol:
Do any of them bathe ?
I commmend Werner on his accomplishment over tha last 40 years :roll:
Awesome place !
:roll:

[Tamianth]

Congrats Greg!
I've been following this thread practically from the start.... its been very interesting. Now You just keep posting up progress pics! :smile:

[luke frisbee]

Looks like the blind hog in Iowa has found a few hundred Acorns...Now warm the damn errr dang pond, even ONE degree will result in more spawn surviving and faster growth and health.

Grashopper,
Koi are still attached to their natural genetics. No attempt by man has been made to modify their breeding pattern nor their maturation at the fry stage.... and Mother nature has been screwing with their fry for millions of years.

(plus I kow some koi breeder who each year "tests" the ability of his ponds' temp concerning whether it is warm enough to start breeding...he uses his lower grade breeders to see...and each year he gets great fry clouds from the first spawnings.)
That and the Fish know when it is time...

[luke frisbee]

and grasshopper,
you can still loose the whole dang batch...watch it.
DO all you can. Do not sit on your hands.

[luke frisbee]

the silver lining with only having a few hundred fry is that you will not have to cull. And you get to see what I have learned by keeping all the fry for a year....even the ones that don't look like they will be anything....Keep every non-deformed fish........wait and watch.

[luke frisbee]

Oh and one other thing...I knew they would be there...i just couldn't tell whether you'd bother to check before they got up in size (and 2/3rds of them would be dead)

[GregBickal]

Boy I can tell Luke is excited, I got 4 posts out of that one :wink:

Weather is warming up. Water temp last night at dusk (with plastic on) was 68 degrees, so were out of the woods. I'm leaving the plastic on until it makes it too hot.

Lots more of them last night. All stuck to the sides of the liner with that head pad, so they must still be hatching. Probably gonna have a lot of Tobis with some hatching early and others hatching late.

Hopefully it will be a great year. Just a few pure breed will really do the trick !!

[Jackie Ramo]

You may have to ship a few down to Luke so he can mother them for you :grin: I forget which board I read it on but some people sent eggs via fed ex one year and they lived and hatched. Now Luke is wondering why I didn't remember this earlier!!!

[luke frisbee]

I am looking forward to making my selections

[Jackie Ramo]

Greg, send him the Tanchos, he needs one :frisbee:

[luke frisbee]

tancho are a gimmick fish. :mad:

[Jackie Ramo]

So, a gimmick... yes mom natures has some great gimmicks... how many do you want?


Hey Greg, I want commission on the sale!!!

[GregBickal]

Or visit my Spawning Blog (http://home.mchsi.com/~bickalkoi/spawning/INDEX.HTM)

Saturday - April 30, 2005
Pond is still covered with plastic. Water temp is 68F. Some of the fry are free swimming, others are still sticking to the sides of the tank. Water is very light green. I'm slightly worried about them having enough to eat. I started up a batch of brine shrimp. Should be ready to feed Sunday night.

Sunday - May 1, 2005
IT SNOWED. Air temps were in the mid 40's all weekend. Brine Shrimp have hatched out. About 3pm I feed about 1/4 of the Brine Shrimp to the baby koi. They didn't agressively attack them like I have seen in the past, so I'm thinking the water temperature is a little too low for them, or mabye they are just a little small to eat the shrimp yet. Around 8pm, I put one of the baby koi under the microscope, and sure enough its belly was full of Shrimp, so I feed another 1/4 of the Shrimp. I also took a picture of one of the Brine Shrimp under the Microscope. Way cool looking, like little boats with mini oars. The picture on the left is 100X magnification of a Brine Shrimp. The picture on the right is 40x. The Brine Shrimp are circled in red, underneath the koi. Just to give you a perspective on their sized.

I also took live video of the Brine Shrimp Swimming around, and of the baby koi. But I need to find somewhere to put the files.

Monday - May 2, 2005
IT SNOWED AGAIN. Air temps were in the upper 30's this morning. Water temp was 50F......OUCH. Baby koi look unaffected by the temperature. I go ahead and feed them another 1/4 of the Brine Shrimp.

[GregBickal]

I think Luke might be interested in this one :wink: :frisbee:

[Terri]

If I'd never seen a koi fry before I would think that was some sort of "alien" LOL Great shots Greg, thanks for the update. Been keeping my fingers crossed this batch of fry come through your cold spell (that we are sharing with you BTW).

The BBS is very cool up-close, the thumbnail reminds me of a moth. Got any photo's of your BBS brewing factory?

Now That's a TANCHO! Luke, hurry and put dibs on that one! :twisted:

[GregBickal]

This year I am using 1 gallon milk jugs to hatch out the Brine shrimp. I dont have any pictures of that, but I do have pictures of last years setup... Here ya go...

[Terri]

Cool :grin:

How long do the BBS last after hatching... do you move them to an aquarium? Do you feed them? Or do you just do enough at a time for feeding the fry over a 24hr period?

[GregBickal]

I have seen them alive in the pond about 6 hours later. I'll bring some to work tomorrow and put in my aquarium and see how long they last exactly. I run 2 containers and feed at 12 hour intervals. Hatching time at 24hours works out perfect, however I think 36hours is a little better but then you need 3 containers and I have trouble keeping that straight. The Shrimps (insert forrest gump tingy here) will actually live for several days in the salt water, but they loose their nutritional value as they consume their eggsacks.

The shrimp are a little big for the fry right now. So if the Shrimp were allowed to grow a little they might be too large. I would like to experiment feeding them and growing them to a larger size. It would sure help out as the koi get bigger.

I have 2 more cans of Shrimp on order.

Its suppose to be 28F tonight with a heavy FROST..... HEY Mr Weather man, this is IOWA in May, its suppost to be warm......Brrrrrrrrrrrr.... This weekend looks to be mid 70's, so we should be back to normal.

[Jackie Ramo]

Greg, thanks for taking the time to keep us up to date. We are all routing for you and the babies. You may find world wide shipping is in your future :lol:

We are sharing the weather with you. Ice pellets today and sleet.... natsy nasty nasty. :-x

[luke frisbee]

heat lamps.....Bickal de-icers...anything to hold the temp up will give you big rewards for the rest of this growing season and years beyond...or you can live the daily life of a chucklehead.

[luke frisbee]

NOW PICKLE,
these fish have dealt with more crap than they should have already. They could use some help.
And on either KoiBito or madaboutkoi a gent mentioned a species of microorganism that was a great fry food...cultured easy and lived in freshwater. So it would reproduce in the fry pond if not eaten. Bout a month back I read it.

[GregBickal]

Fed another batch of brine shrimp last night. Koi had very fat bellys from the previous batch. Yes, I need to learn to culture Rotifers or a fresh water variety, but I'll stick to what I know for right now. My batch of green water that I was trying to brew with the goat poop has not gotten green. Could be the cold weather. I'll experiment with that all summer until I get it right.

I redid the plastic over the pond last night. Raised the plastic of the water about 3", sealed all the holes. Everybody was looking ship shape this morning. Well, everyone except my large koi in the main pond, they have been suffering for a couple weeks now. Laying on the edges, covering themselves in hair algae.

I was wondering if I could heat the airspace with a small space heater to give the koi some extra heat, but didnt have a good way to set it up and was worried something would go wrong (meaning it would end up in the water and electricute the fish.

Sun is out bright and its suppose to get to 60 today, so the'll get some heat.

[GregBickal]

Are you guys ready for more pictures ? Ok, I suppose, if you twist my arm...

Oh oh, look what I found :twisted: Some yummy for my fry, yep, yepper..... Used a little peice of airhose to psyphone alot of these guys and feed them to the fry.... I also took some live video of these guys swimming around... MAN do they move...

Im trying to keep a culture of them going in a kiddy pool. Got some chicken poo last night, and trying to get a good batch of green water going..

See Luke, I was listening..

[GregBickal]

Ok, Im sure Luke is anxious to start culling.... Here's a group shot of just a few fry (I counted 83).

[GregBickal]

Zoomed in Shot. Looks like one is showing some color already. Sumi Up... :grin:

[Busy B]

Progress!!! Just great that some lived...now the work begins?

Was the one closeup a pic of rotifers?

[GregBickal]

Water flee of some sort, theres one on this page like it:
http://www.gpmatthews.nildram.co.uk/microscopes/cladocera.html

[Jackie Ramo]

Those babies are really growing. Another week and Luke will be culling them.

I remember the firs time I saw a water flea under the scope, I jumped back about 5 ft and then laughed at myself. Looked like it was coming right at me :lol:

[GregBickal]

I brought 30 fry to work this morning. I have them in my 30 gallon tank (no other fish in there).

I have brine shrimp in there for them to eat (which has made work a very fun experience).

Anyway, I have been noticing a couple of the fry have a hard time staying boyant. Always bobbing up and down going toward the surface. Since they are translucient, It appears as tho their swim bladders are empty. Which would explain them wanting to sink like rocks, and their weird swimming behavior.

They are long past the days when they should have filled their swim bladder for the first time, so Im wondering if this is a defect, or just something that happend from transport stress.

What do you think .000001cc shot of Amikacin to the armpit !rofl

[Jackie Ramo]

Perhaps a dip in 20 ppm of PP - that should make them gasp and fill their swim bladders.

Maybe King Culler will have an idea when he pops in. Don't invite him over for lunch though.

[GregBickal]

You know, it looks like only the darker colored fry are the ones with the problems also. Hmmmm, seems to me I recall something about Showa fry having defects, anybody remember more about that ?

[luke frisbee]

I'd be wasting my time in other ways than trying to figure out why two fry have a hard time staying neutrally bouyant....My guess, and this is a guess....the fry could use shallow warm water....or some very strong sunlight on submerged vegetation that produces an overabundance of oxygen in bubble form...the fry might grazy some fry-sized bits of gas.

[GregBickal]

My brine shrimp stay alive 24 hours in my aquarium at work. Complete fresh water.

Since im at work, with nothing to do, I have plenty of time to waste. Its either stare at the fry all day, sleep, or surf this forum :grin:

Got my 2 cans of brine shrimp in the mail last night. Its hard to tell if the koi outside are getting enough to eat. I still see shrimp in their bellies when I go to give them their next feeding, so Im assuming they are getting enough.

Im hatching 2 tablespoons of 90% Brine Shrimp every 12 hours. I dont know how many fry so let say at least 1,000 and I think less than 5,000.

Is it enough ? Where's Sinsia Keifer at ?

[Jackie Ramo]

If you start seeing a lot of tobies, it isn't enough :frisbee:

Will the shirmp live in the pond with the fry or is the water too cold and they die? If they live then you can increase the number and have a self feeding program but if they die...

[Swamprat]

NOW PICKLE,
these fish have dealt with more crap than they should have already. They could use some help.
And on either KoiBito or madaboutkoi a gent mentioned a species of microorganism that was a great fry food...cultured easy and lived in freshwater. So it would reproduce in the fry pond if not eaten. Bout a month back I read it.
ROTIFERZ
:wink:

[kgt3]

My brine shrimp stay alive 24 hours in my aquarium at work. Complete fresh water.

Since im at work, with nothing to do, I have plenty of time to waste. Its either stare at the fry all day, sleep, or surf this forum :grin:

Got my 2 cans of brine shrimp in the mail last night. Its hard to tell if the koi outside are getting enough to eat. I still see shrimp in their bellies when I go to give them their next feeding, so Im assuming they are getting enough.

Im hatching 2 tablespoons of 90% Brine Shrimp every 12 hours. I dont know how many fry so let say at least 1,000 and I think less than 5,000.

Is it enough ? Where's Sinsia Keifer at ?

Hey Greg,

Its plenty! Most food live or otherwise that is thrown to fry of this age goes to waste. This is not to say that to much food is being used. Fry are purely sight feeders at this stage and the abundance of squigley jerking brine shrimp
will stimulate them to strike and feed. So pour it on and let them gourge.

[GregBickal]

I am an Optimist, however I prefer to go through life Pessimistically, that way, if things take a turn for the worst, its a little easier to stomach when your hopes arent up.

The cold spell is over. The warm weather, and a nice thunderstorm triggered the koi to spawn Sunday morning. I collected more eggs that I ever have in my life. The koi which spawned this time were all my domestic ones, however the Japanese males were all over them, so I went ahead and collected the eggs.

here are the domestic females that spawned:
http://bickal.home.mchsi.com/koi2004/pb140087.jpghttp://bickal.home.mchsi.com/koi2004/pb140146.jpg

I know, Luke will say why am I wasting my space, but what the heck, I can always use them as food for my other koi fry. I threw the eggs in my empty 3000 gallon pool that is good and green now. We'll see what happens. I can always borrow the skid loader and dig more pools :grin:

[luke frisbee]

You should have been using that other pond for half the Jap fry...or holding it back for the first "seperation" Notice I did not say culling......Jap culls are better than YOUR domestic keepers.

[luke frisbee]

The Orange female is OK...that yellow thing has such a cloudy head it needs to be sold to someone with a very green pond (so they won't have to look at either.) :lol:

[GregBickal]

You should have been using that other pond for half the Jap fry
Your so predictable. Do I know what your gonna say before you say it or what :frisbee:

Jap culls are better than YOUR domestic keepers.
Jap culls may be, but my culls from Japanese stock wont :grin: When it gets down to culling time, I aint going to be keeping 500 pure white koi, or pure orange koi, even if they are from Japanese Stock.

My domestic females that spawned were patternless metallics, so combine those with Japanese males and you never know, I might just get some interesting looking koi. I have the space, its worth a looksee.


that yellow thing has such a cloudy head
My hard water does that. Its not the kois fault. That yellow thing, altho a scaled variety, looks pretty close to this Beni Kikokuryu (http://www.usakoi.com/photos/101431Photo.JPG) that Mark Bodycott has for sale on his site. Marks Koi on the left, mine on the right for comparison.
http://www.usakoi.com/photos/101431Photo.JPGhttp://bickal.home.mchsi.com/koi2004/pb140087.jpg

[luke frisbee]

Point...that koi is for sale (hint hint)...and I gotta tell ya AGAIN. Solid colored jap babies will get color as time goes by. When I got a batch of 1-2 inch non-culls from japan after two months I asked what to cull out. Some Lady (sanke, or jackie maybe) told me to keep all the ones that weren't deformed if I had room as there would be changes. So I did. I was very happy.
Solid well-shaped ogons are a good thing too.

[GregBickal]

Ok, I can go along with that reasoning. My Aka Sanke had started out as an orange koi and slowly developed Sumi and a white belly. So If I threw away all white koi, I could potentially be getting rid of some Shiro Utsuri. Ok, dont want to do that. I was just going to get rid of any white koi that didnt have any submerged sumi.

[GregBickal]

Got 2" of rain last night. The fry pond had overflowed onto the dirt (2" of rain over a 14x18 area would be about 315 gallons). I couldn't see any fry in the pool left in the dirt, but then again they are soooo small. Note to self: Add an overflo tub with very fine screen to keep the fry in the pool. :)

The fry have very full bellies, but I have noticed that there aren't any Brine Shrimp left in the water when I give them their next feedings. Decided to increase the production of brine shrimp hatching from 2 to 3 tablespoons of eggs every 12 hours. Hopefully that will be enough. Estimate that I have at least 5,000 fry.

I wonder if the number of Brine Shrimp eggs that I hatch out every 12 hours should increase by a tablespoon (tsp) each week.... The fry are currently 15 days old (call it week 3)

example...
Week 1 - 1tsp
Week 2 - 2tsp
Week 3 - 3tsp
Week 4 - 4tsp
Week 5 - 5tsp
Week 6 - Flakes or small Pellets ?

[luke frisbee]

Ground flake food NOW...along with the damn sea monkeys...put a little flake food in the water. Whatch it, when it starts to sink add a few sea monkeys.
the sea monkeys will crank up the feeding frenzy and the fry will hit anything that moves...even if it is sinking.
Soon they learn to eat ground up flakes..which ARE a better staple diet than sea monkeys.

[Jackie Ramo]

Luke, Why do you think that highly processed food is better than fresh?

[Swamprat]

Luke, Why do you think that highly processed food is better than fresh?
Added vitamins and anti`oxidantzzz.
Luke is spot on...
He did say " combo"
:wink:

[Jackie Ramo]

Soon they learn to eat ground up flakes..which ARE a better staple diet than sea monkeys.

Sounded like he wanted to switch them totally, a combination I can understand.

[GregBickal]

The reason I was holding off on powdered flakes was I read somewhere that it can clog their gills and kill them.

Ok, great. Instead of increasing my brine shrimp production, I will start feeding powdered flakes immediately.

The fry from the Sunday spawning started hatching yesterday.

Did I move to Canada, today is 47F, just came out of nowhwere.... Dang weatherman.

[Jackie Ramo]

Stop sharing your darn cold weather with us... darn fish would pose for the photgrapher today, mad cuz they are cold.

[GregBickal]

Tried feeding some powdered up flakes to the fish here at work in the aquarium. They eat a particle, spit it right out. Repeat that over and over.

They still too small ? or whats the deal ?

[luke frisbee]

Koi food tastes about as bland as dry dogfood. They gotta learn that it will fill the hole.

[Jackie Ramo]

Hmmmm, maybe we should take up a collection for Luke... first he eats the ugly fish, then the dog food, now he's eating the fish flakes.... !rofl

[GregBickal]

I already sent hims some flakes, I could send him a whole case if hes that hungry .... Altho he's gotta find some time to send me some FLOATERS first !bonk

[luke frisbee]

bubba you are real close to getting those weeds...but you keep posting about the CANADIAN COLD AIR

[Jackie Ramo]

Luke you could do us all a favour and send up some of that Florida HOT AIR !rofl

[Tamianth]

Luke,much as I love your sarcasm, fascitiouse nature and wit, I just gotta do it, its too good to pass up!

Now get yourself on a plane for Canada......

Is that enough Jackie? Or shall I round up a couple more? I'm sure I can find a few more round someplace if I look hard enough!

!rofl

[Jackie Ramo]

Seems Luke's hot air was enough, warm and sunny today :lol:

[luke frisbee]

You two owe me NOW

[Jackie Ramo]

Do you want cold air, we have lots of that blowing around up here. I have a pond full of ugly fish as well :frisbee:

[GregBickal]

3rd cold snap this spring. Temperatures are 20 degrees below average. Frost again last night. I thought global warming was suppost to make Iowa warmer...NOT COLDER!!! Jeez, what a PITA.

Anyway..... Fry are doing great... Oh yeah, I have a little more than just a few. Heres a group shot of just a few over in one corner... BTW, I counted the fry in this photo, yep 1000. So I must easily have 10,000 in my pool.

:lol:

Looks like I'll be doing some culling at some point. Right now, I can only tell about 3 colors of fry: Brown, Yellow, White.

[Busy B]

Oh man :eek: That's alot of babies!

How are you at culling? I wouldn't know which ones make the cut.

[GregBickal]

They gotta get bigger before I can start culling. I cant tell what from what right now. If I was culling for just Showa, it would be easy, but Im not so I gotta wait.

[luke frisbee]

Pickal,
pull your head outta your butt, toss all the domestic fry into a baby pool in the side yard. Give these fry ALL your resources. ALL ALL ALL ALL your resources.
50% of these koi will be better than 99% of your domestic fry. if you treat these fry right you will have 1000 koi that were better than all the koi you bred last year.
or you can still hold on to the belief that you won't damage these fry by only giving them enough of your resources to keep most of them alive and growing....that is what a backyard breeder always does...makes the wrong decisions.

[Tamianth]

:lol:

I'll be sure and look around for one of those Tancho's for ya Luke since you love them so well! :grin:

When your done with it Jackie, send some my way! :smile:

Greg....... thats awesome! They are so fascinating when they are so small like that!

[GregBickal]

Ever heard the phrase, dont put all your eggs in one basket !rofl Devoting ALL ALL ALL of your resources to one venture is a pretty narrow short sighted approach. Success through diversity. !bonk

50% of these koi will be better than 99% of your domestic fry
Your right here, it is a numbers game, the more fry I can produce, the more chance I'll find a few (that 1% you refer to) that are spectacular. Domestic or Japanese. If I 100,000 domestic fry, 1% is still 1,000 koi that have some potential.

Growing out koi, yes, I want to give them the best resources, but typically fry are kept in smaller quarters during this first month.

[Swamprat]

[QUOTE=GregBickal]Ever heard the phrase, dont put all your eggs in one basket !rofl Devoting ALL ALL ALL of your resources to one venture is a pretty narrow short sighted approach. Success through diversity. !bonk


Hmmm Does that apply to veterinarians..

[luke frisbee]

Pickle I've been as nice as I could possibly be to you concerning your consistent lack of a goal or an understanding of what your limitations are and how you could achieve them.
Don't ever give me a lame saying as an answer. You have 10,000 jap fry...put them in multiple baskets (ie ponds) you idiot.

tell me, if you were a beef farmer and had enough land to grow out 200 calves a year, and a man gave you two hundred head of prime Angus calves, would you bunch up the Angus calves and still grow out your stringy macdonald burgers on legs? or would you send them to market to make room for the Angus?
Wait, i know the answer, you so damn ephen dumb you'd keep some of the worthless cattle so you wouldn't have all your eggs in one basket.
Your reply was worthless. there is no good reason to keep those worthless Domestic fry, hell you don't have a facility for even growing out 10,000 fry.
listen I'll shut up now. I think I have finally got it. You can't be told anything. you can't figure anything out. You have to be hit over the head everytime.
Your learning curve is almost a flat line huh Bubba.
If you don't throw out ALL those Domestics then i'll just leave you alone. Cuz you don't wanna hear how poorly you are breeding koi.

[Swamprat]

Damn, Luke !
Ya think ya hurt his feelingz ? LOL

NOT !!!

And The Lord Sayeth :
Le there be Bickakgoi
Ad so It was.

' quoting from most current End Times blog" !rofl

[GregBickal]

:lol:

Luke, I have enough drama in my life already to waste my energy justifying myself to you. Save your slur of insults and condesending demenor for someone who wants you to mentor them, cause I dont. !bonk

[GregBickal]

Here's some new pictures. 23 days old. These are ones that are in my aquarium at work. Photographed them using a frisbee... Hey go figure, pefect color blue :wink:

[Tamianth]

Sweet Gregg! :smile:

[luke frisbee]

Pickal,
where did I slur or insult you? You are what I stated. You are sorta like the epher. you got some resources but you can't break out of your typical behavior pattern to take advantage of them.
So you got alot of other crap going on in your life? Well that's just another reason to get rid of the worthless fry.

[Jackie Ramo]

Those fry look martian to me with their glow in the dark eyes!!! Showing some growth after only 23 days. Are they bigger or smaller than the pond raised ones?

[Busy B]

Hariwake, ogon? The possibilities are endless...

[GregBickal]

I have about 30 fry in my 30 gallon tank at work (1 fry per gallon). I have (estimated) 10,000 fry outside in 3,000gallons (3.5 fry per gallon). Growth seems to be identical. I am feeding an estimated million and a half Brine Shrimp a day (works out to 150 shrimp per fry), plus powdered flake food. Their bellys always seem to be full and poop trails comming out, so I think they are getting plenty of food.

The fry in the picture on the left are from the pure Japansese Spawn. 24 days old. The black square in the picture is a 1"x1" square.

The fry in the picture on the right are from the Domestic/Japanese Spawn. 9 days old. The black square in the picture is a 1"x1" square.

Third picture is a comparison of the 2 side by side, same scale.

[Jackie Ramo]

They sure are growing fast!! Now are these fry from the aquarium or the pond? Just trying to keep trackof who's who here.

[GregBickal]

Pond fry.

[Jackie Ramo]

Thanks.

[Busy B]

What's your daughter think? Does she want to keep them all? :grin:

[GregBickal]

Daughter likes them alot. Every night she has to turn off all the lights to the indoor tanks. Its a serious ritual. She says "time for ni nite fishies pappa ?". She even gets her own little pail full of Brine Shrimp for when we go feed the fish.

My Dainichi Baby Koi pellets arrived today. 39% protien. I threw about a dozen of them in and after they soaked awhile the baby koi started pecking at them. They always try the powdered flakes and just spit them out, but this they seemed to eat. They are going through Brine Shrimp so fast I cant keep up. They seem to be able to eat several hundred Brine Shrimp EACH in a period of just an hour or so. Seems like the amount of Brine Shrimp you feed them does need to double about every week...... 1tsp -2-4-8-16-32... you get the drift...

[Jackie Ramo]

Your daughter is sooo cute Greg, must take after her mother :-P

Well having seen how big these fry are getting so quickly I'm not surprised they have started eating you out of house and home. Any Tobis?

[GregBickal]

No tobis yet. I must be keeping them fed very well. I have some small ones, and some medium sized ones, but for the most part, they are all very large.

Had another spawning yesterday sometime. I was gone all day and didn't get back until very late. It was my Karasu Female. Found her in the stream this morning. She must have went over last night in the frenzy (full moon going on).

Ive got 4 spawning ropes full of eggs. But Im sure Luke would be very upset with me if I saved them in a kiddy pool somewhere :frisbee: I have way more fry than I can raise now....

What to do, what to doo........
http://bickal.home.mchsi.com/koi2004/pb000014.jpg

[GregBickal]

Oh yeah, here's what that Karasu looked like as a tosai. Surely I wouldnt want to keep any of the fry from this spawn..... :???:

[Jackie Ramo]

Greg I am sure some of the new eggs will survive as fry in the main pond without you doing anything. Better get a second job so you can afford to feed them though. :grin:

[GregBickal]

Last year only 6 fry survived in the main pond to a 6" size. Those 6 are still in there, so I doubt anything will survive with those guys in there eating the smaller stuff.

I started buying the 70% Brine Shrimp eggs from Brine Shrimp Direct (http://www.brineshrimpdirect.com/). I was getting the 90% eggs from AES, but they rip you on shipping and the eggs were $35 a can (90% hatch). The 70% hatch eggs are like $12 a can and will go alot further for the money.

If you figure 3 cans of the 70% hatch cost the same as one can of the 90% hatch, thats 90% vs. 210%.

I'm also picking up some 2 gallon water bottles tonight to use as hatching containers so I can hatch out huge quantities of eggs at once (without having banks of hatching containers). Right now a gallon milk jug can only hatch out 3 tablespoons of eggs (around 3/4 million artemia).

At 3 tablespoons a hatching, and 2 hatchings a day, a can will last 7 days.
So probably spend under $200 in brine shrimp for around 10,000 fry. After that they should be on small pellets.

[Jackie Ramo]

I'm surprised only 6 survived. Is this before or after the auto feeder??

That is one heck of a lot of brine shrimp!!! How long do brine shrimp live? Never had sea monkeys as a child :(

[GregBickal]

After the auto feeder. Before the auto feeder NONE would survive.

[Jackie Ramo]

Keep the daughter away from the pond!!! especially if the autofeeder is empty!!! :lol: Now I know why they are called wet pigs!!! Still I've never had a problem with fry surviving in my pond. I even stop feeding when they spawn in hopes of limiting the survivors.

[Swamprat]

After the auto feeder. Before the auto feeder NONE would survive.
LOL.
Erik tell ya that ?
How much ? LOL

[GregBickal]

Huh ? Ive been using an auto-feederzzzz for 2 yearzzz nowzzz (since July 2003). Pretty vocal about itzzz. Its the AES modelzzzz, not the other one.

Anyway, heres some fry pictures for you, fresh off the pond.

[Swamprat]

Amazing diversity, huh...
The fourth already has YOUR look :frisbee:
Which batch are these ?

[GregBickal]

These are from the pure Japanese batch. Flock spawning. Only female was the Showa. After I watch this first batch develop a little further, next year I should have a good handle on what I can cull out early.

What say you master Dougglezzz... Lets see if I can guess what they will turn out to be
#1 Sanke
#2 Shiro Utsuri
#3 Platinum Ogon
#4 Metalic something something
#5 Sanke

[GregBickal]

I just pulled out 200 dead fry from my Jap pool. Scraped a live one which was struggling, found nothing (including gills). Gills looked black. Scraped another live one it was crawling with costia.

I dont have any Proform on hand, and nobody in town carries it. Can I use PP or what would you recommend ?

I got costia in with my Jap koi, flukes too. Ive treated my parent stock with proform per its schedule and scoped and found nothing on repeated scopings. As for other contamination, the God DANGED frogs could be a source. Ive been removing them by the dozens.

Otherswise, I put some airstones out in the pond about a week ago. I left them sitting in a bucket with 1 gallon of water and 1tsp of PP for about 5 minutes. Could those airstones still be the source of contamination, and if so, that would mean that I still have not elminiated Costia in my indoor tanks either.

Im so glad I got Japanese koi.... Its been a very fun 6 months. :cry:

[Swamprat]

Frogz.
PP at 4ppm for about 2 hours.. sit right there the whole time with ST.
If they look OK at 2 hours wait till hour 3 then, ST/halting treatment.
Your going to lose more during the treatment that already have compromizzzed gillz.
Save what you can...
I hate costia

[GregBickal]

So its a 3,000 gallon tank. I don't have a gram scale. Ive always used a teaspoon. Let me double-check my dosage - Is it 1 teaspoon per 1,000 gallons for 1ppm ?

ST ? Hydrogen Peroxide ?

Im in a serious case of dispair today.

[Nancy N]

Hi Greg, So sorry to see this thread, not sure if your asking about the PP or not..should be 4 tablespoons per 1000 gallons. Hope things work out for you, I know how hard your trying, sometimes it's just too much. Hang in there, it's a learning curve though a painful one.
Take care, Nancy (your Il buddy)

Where is everybody? I wish I could help you, not sure about fry. :(

[GregBickal]

I think I might have meant to say Tablespoon instead of Teaspoon. So yeah 4 per thousand.

Im so frustrated with the problems that ive had as of late (ever since I got REAL KOI).

[Nancy N]

I hear you, it seems others are having some prob's with them as well.
I know very little about breeding and survival so I'm the wrong person to talk to but I do know how hard it is when you care about them and try to save them. As long as you're doing your best and taking notes that's all you can do.

[Jackie Ramo]

It is NOT 4 tablespoons per 1,000 gallons !!!! unless you are looking to dose much higher than I ever would.!!!


Go to Roaks site and use the calculator there!!!!

[GregBickal]

Im not sure what my scoup is at home that I have attached to my PP bucket. Its the smaller one. I think I use the tablespoon one for brine shrimp eggs. I checked out Roarks...

Compound: Potassium Permanganate (KMnO4), reagent, fine crystals
Gallons: 3000
PPM (mg/L): 4.0
Grams/TSP: 6.57
Run Date: Thursday, June 02, 2005 02:50:56 PM PDT

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Weight
Milligram: 45424.800 mg
Grains: 700.905 gr
Grams: 45.425 gm
Ounces: 1.602 oz
Pounds: 0.100 lb
Kilograms: 0.045 kg

Volume
Teaspoons: 6.914 tsp
Tablespoons: 2.305 tbsp
Cups: 0.144 cup
CC's (mL): 34.570 cc
Fl. Ounces: 1.219 fl oz
Liters: 0.035 L

[Nancy N]

GAWD! I am so sorry and glad you did'nt listen to me! My terrible error and I hate the stuff! I was reading Blammo and he said that amount but to kill bugs off plants and I had no business posting that number not being 100% sure myself! I would have never forgiven myself if you would have done that Greg!
Thanks Jackie, now I know why I stay out of chemical threads and this is one product that scares me..I'm sorry.

[Jackie Ramo]

So 4 tablespoons was almost 8 ppm....

I always use Roark's site for double checking my measures. Even though I've written them down and my pond volume hasn't changed. Silly but I always feel better. :roll:

[GregBickal]

Dont worry, I would have used my normal spoon at home anyway. I normally do my doses at 2ppm according to the chart, so I would have been ok.

[Nancy N]

Thank God! I'll never do that again, ya know, we use to sell it but I never memorized the doses. When I read that I thought it was ok for fish too, I really am so relieved! That's one of the dumbest things I ever did and I had to come over here and do it yet... :roll:

[Swamprat]

Good Lord...
Even B00Bs bookie calls for a TEAspoon per 600. Thats about 2.7 PPM...
WRITE 1/600 On your bottle so you never screw up. That way if yer shooting for 6PPM and come up with a crazy amount like 12 spoons you'll know you need to slow down and re-think.

If only B00B woulda remembered what he supposedly wrote in Da Bookie when he wiped his whole pond " cuz he sucks at math"...

1000 mg is 1 gram.. Never forget that.
PPM = mg/liter
Why ? One liter of water weighs exactly 1 Kilogram and a MILLI gram is one millionth of a Kilo !
To continue :
1000 grams is a Kilo.
Seeing a pattern here ?
.0001
.001
.01
.1
1.0



ST is sodium thiosulphate, dechlor.
Peroxide is do-able only with larger fish and then care is needed.
Use ST or dechlor with the little ones.... Peroxide in a crisis or with 6 inch plus fish and lower doses of PP (under 5 ppm)

Greg. Dig up a can of money outa the yard and go get a scale... a good one.
Look for a book ( not Bookie) By Hoole.. Cyprinids.... you'll be fine.
Get Luke to read it to you. :-)~

OK OK.. ONE TO SIX HUNDRED
ONE TO SIX HUNDRED
ONE TO SIX HUNDRED

:lol:

[luke frisbee]

Ok Blammz, I got it one two six-hundred
12600

[Jackie Ramo]

Thanks for making it simple Rat.

Greg, I know this isn't your first time using PP and I know you'd be careful.

Nancy not to worry, blame it all on management, I would, they are making you crazy of there. We all shoot from memory sometimes, problem is, memory is unreliable especially for something you don't use all the time.

[GregBickal]

Ok, got home last night. About 200 more dead fry. Started the PP treatment about 5:15pm. 6 teaspoons of PP. Treatment lasted until about 7pm. Fry were looking great, tadpoles didnt seem to mind the treatment. THe water was green so I figure it probably burned up alot of the PP. I waited until 8pm and repeated the treatment. It was to dark to tell when it ended.

I didnt have any Declohr on hand (I have well water), but I didnt need it.Definetly not my first time using PP.... My learning disability prevents me from understanding everything Doug says :wink: But I get it... Sorry I read your second post after I got done with the treatment.

Everybody looking good this morning. I will do 10% water changes for the next week. I'll also scrape and scope tonight.

Thanks for the help guys.

[Swamprat]

Ok Blammz, I got it one two six-hundred
12600
Indeed, Indeed.
A vicktim of the Flouriday eduMakayshinnall sistem
:wink:

" Sweet home Alabama, eh ?"

Was it " Where the skiez are so blue" ?
"OR
Where the B00B'z are so few ?"

Tell me true !

[Swamprat]

BTW Mullet feller..
The dechlor was for neutralizzing the PP..
No matter if you have a well or not.
I hope it works out.
If you find anything ? Nail their assez again.. Sorry, Mom .. Azzez
Keep the dechlor by the well so you know where it is.

Hey.
Remember a band called Cinderella ?
My kids used to like them.
I killed them.. !dude

[luke frisbee]

let me guess...dimlin?

[Swamprat]

Any alive ?

[GregBickal]

Scraped and scoped this morning.... Their Historyzzzz !!!!

Thanks guys. I have had costia come back before when I use PP, so i'm gonna keep scraping and checking them on a regular basis.

Looks like I lost close to 500. I see a few more whose gills are black that wont make it, but I should be out of the woods.

Its time for daily.... Waterchange, waterchange, waterchange... 10% as Luke says... Get this water quality back to normal. Since, im outside, Im thinking I gonna hook up a timer and autofloat and get this thing to just do a 10% daily and automatically.

[Swamprat]

Scraped and scoped this morning.... Their Historyzzzz !!!!

Thanks guys. I have had costia come back before when I use PP, so i'm gonna keep scraping and checking them on a regular basis.

Looks like I lost close to 500. I see a few more whose gills are black that wont make it, but I should be out of the woods.

Its time for daily.... Waterchange, waterchange, waterchange... 10% as Luke says... Get this water quality back to normal. Since, im outside, Im thinking I gonna hook up a timer and autofloat and get this thing to just do a 10% daily and automatically.

Good plan.

[Jackie Ramo]

Hey.
Remember a band called Cinderella ?
My kids used to like them.
I killed them.. !dude


You killed your kids!!!! !bonk

[luke frisbee]

Rambo. Good one!

Ratzz, you just like the automatic 10% changes cuz it is getting closer to "FLOW THROUGH".....
Course if they were my Jap fry I'd have halved them into the two ponds so they could spread out and have better water quality so the costia couldn't beat em up as easily...but,

[Swamprat]

You killed your kids!!!! !bonk

I miss them.
Ya know anyone that wansta go halves on another ?
:-? :twisted: :smile:

[Jackie Ramo]

I'll go you one better, I have one "Free to a good home"!!! I'll keep the grandson!

[GregBickal]

Course if they were my Jap fry I'd have halved them into the two ponds so they could spread out and have better water quality so the costia couldn't beat em up as easily...but,

Knew that one was comming. Yeah, I think I read somewhere that Costia was less deadly when the koi were kept in twice the volume of water... !bonk

[GregBickal]

We'll found 200 more dead fry this morning. Scraped and scoped several that were struggling at the surface and found nothing. Scraped a recently dead one and found one little tiny moving ich spot, and this weird looking thing. I dont know if them being dead means that normal critters come in to devour the corpse. The critters long appendage appeared to move around like an elephant's trunk.

[Jackie Ramo]

I don't believe Costia stays long on a dead host. But it doesn't take long for the scavengers of all sizes to find them.

[GregBickal]

I only scrape the live koi for costia. I usually pick the ones that are at the surface, belly up, but still breathing and flapping their tail.

[Jackie Ramo]

The costia I had came back time after time until almost all the fish were dead. Used PP until the pond was black and they still came back. Used proform C as the label directs and never had a problem. Sure wish it had been available when all my original fish were dying.

[luke frisbee]

greg,
I do not enjoy your suffering. Although you may not take my advice here it is.....divide the groups and treat each group differently. If something works you will have to go back and do it to ALL the groups over again since the "frogs" will carry the 'bug' back to all the ponds.

[Ian]

Fry are weak, Costia would make a days work out of a fry pond. More water, less PP. Can't see a whole lot of fry living in water that would promote a costia outbreak. Can see numbers die off if the water is not steady! Costia is the end result of poor water quality, not frogs or birds. It spends it's life eating waste,algae and such in the pond. If in high numbers(dirty pond lots of food) and a koi is stressed(weak immune system) some will change to parasitic form to take advantage of a new food source, a koi with it's defence system down.
Go for the source not a med.

[GregBickal]

Found 200 more dead last night. 50 more this morning.

I have four 500 gallon kiddy pools. I am going to fill those up with the water from the hatching pool and separate off some of the fry and treat as Luke suggests.

As for water quality, Ammonia is 0, Nitrite is 0. I am circulating water through the settling chamber and filter using a 475gph pump. That turnover rate is way to low I realize, but the fry are so little, I have made a 24" long by 4" diameter intakes out of window screen to keep them out of the pump. I have bigger pumps, but the intakes would have to be huge to allow that kind of water movement. I also have a big airstone and half the flow from the Medo pump going to that tank.

I have been doing 10% water changes weekly, and ever since I had fry dying, been doing them every other day.

Since the water tests fine, it must be the accumulated debris at the bottom that is causing the water quality issues ? How the heck do you get all of that out when the fry are so tiny and get sucked up to any little thing ? How do you make bottom drains that dont suck up the fry, but still allow gunk ?

Do you think draining this pond and cleaning it would be in order ? I would be able to save 2000 gallons of the water. Too much stress on the fry ?

Im starting to wonder what it is that I enjoy about breeding these koi. All the fun is gone. I work my arz of day after day, and only wind up loosing. Apparently i'm not up to the task of breeding koi. I might as well just stick to my boring 9-5 job and spend my money and resources on something more fun that doesnt have the constant problems.... How about a Jetski :roll:

[Jackie Ramo]

Greg in the wild millions of them die. So don't feel bad. Splitting them up is a good idea. How are the ones in aqarium doing?

[luke frisbee]

Pickal, the reason I said to have lots of water for each fry is so you don't need to have great filtration and some "natural" food can grow.

[Swamprat]

Ok...
Lewis swears by this stuff..
http://www.united-tech.com/m-aq-toc.html

[Ian]

Come on Greg! Half the fun is if you make a mistake you have to wait till next year :grin: Need a fair bit of water for raising fry and new ponds would make a tougher go at it. I would think 200 fry growing in 2000gals may result in 180 surviving. Push the numbers in such a small fry pond and you up the odds for loosing all the koi.
Makes you appreiciate how a quality koi comes about does it not?
My motto is aim low and you won't be disapointed :grin:

[Jackie Ramo]

I use the United Tech stuff and think it is just great but nothing works instantly except a good water change.

[luke frisbee]

And now a pause in our regular program for this editorial.....
Ian and terri (and whatever enlisted friends they have) could have shut me up, as in censored or banned me for life from this board.... hell it has happened to me on other boards for alot less.
but ya know what, T&I have made this Koi board because koi boards are needed that don't ban people just cuz they have different opinions or different styles of communicating and entertaining. So many of the other koi boards have been opened to sell product, satisfy egos, and espouse their own agenda. While T&I are in the business their egos and personal deecisions on what is proper behavior (ie. what they portray) are not forced upon others.
So thank you T&A...er I, I really meant A...no I! I meant I, I...

And have you seen how greg handle me slamming him? Not many men could take that, but he understood i wasn't being evil. i was just being honest with my thoughts. And THAT is the big difference that idiots in charge of other boards aren't capable of seeing as well...
now back to your regularly scheduled progam....

Pickal,
when you spread out koi it is much ahrder for several disease to go from one koi to another, don't know about costia personally but keeping fry in as great a volume of water as possible will also keep them less stressed and a "little" costia won't kick their tails so hard.

I do ahve a "rookie" concern.....without seeing your fish I am think "trich" for some reason...are you good at spotting trich with a microscope?
the reason it is "rookie"is that I really don't have a clue about trich...but the flag keeps poppping up in my head.....

[Tamianth]

Luke,
That was a very good point and nice of you to point that out! :grin: I wasn't sure how to take you at first, but realized you have a unique way of putting things. !rofl And a sense of humor.......

Oh, and now you can go tell me how ugly my new shusui are...... :lol:

That should take about 5 minutes and give Greg's ears a break, eerrrr eye's!

:twisted:

[Swamprat]

It could be trich but with trich you normally get skin lesions, not ulcers, just " road rash"
The thing about costia is this :
Costia reproduces by cellular division.
It seems to " know" when the fish is stressed out and starts dividing to create it's army.
Ich does the same damned thing. You can have 100 fish swimming around and one is covered up and the others have nothing apparent( its there but not active). Once it kills one, the next weakest in line gets hammered.

Costia, unlike others does NOT normally leave the host to reproduce and "swim around" looking for another host.
This is contrary to some "Bookiez".
This is fact.
" Free swimming" costia are new arrivals or have left a dead fish to attend to another.
Costia dies rapidly without a host. Trich lives, can live, off of mulm.
When MR frog jumps in the pond the osmotic shock scrambles the costia and they MUST find a host, with a quickness.

A fish shipped, with existing costia (most fish do have a few) will have ZILLIONS swimming in the bag water when you unbag it. This is over division due to ammonia and PH stress (on the parasite AND the fish). They all "need" a host and " prefer" not to destroy the only one(s) in the bag. I know. It sounds weird.

This is why you see Waddy, Momotaro, Brady and many others doing a SUPER hot PP or salt dip when moving or shipping fish.
Salt will kill the chit outa fresh water costia at 3%... sea water levels. A few will survive that are in the vent, hence the need for re-treatment.

Now. If I were moving fry and had suspicion of costia I would batch them in 8-9 PPM Potassium for an hour( or until they squealed) and THEN dump them into the new kiddie pool.

Brady salt dips tosai just fine. I wouldnt do it with fry and the PP needs to be thouroughly dissolved in hot water and mixed well with an airstone in the tank before dipping the fry.
A few suspended crystals will wipe the gills on a fry in a heartbeat.
NO CLOUD ALLOWED.

Put something over the pool to keep the damned rain from swinging the temperature so bad.
Re treat in 2 days with a normal dose. 1.5- 2 ppm will do it, in a pristine environment.

Side note : PP at 3ppm will kill the hell out of koi in a pristine environment. The treatment needs to be halted in a few hours.
This breaks the rule of the five fish blunders and pink water for 8 to 12 hours.
"Pink" is not an indicator of ORP.

Last nights new arrivals are swimming in a 10 PPM solution with the flow through set on 50 GPM.
2000 gallons of water. The damned flight was 5 hours late, it was POURING, so I didn't unbag them properly.

I threw the damned fish in the tank, bag water and all !!! Don't try this at home.. LOL

!dude

[Swamprat]

All young sooshcweez ( correct pronunciation) are fugly.

[Tamianth]

:lol: @Swamprat!

Greg, I hope you get things under control there! Sorry to read you have lost so many! :( Costia would be my suspect as well.

[GregBickal]

I'm back from vacation. Sorry about the delay guys. I needed that break bad...

I treated the fry pond with Proform C on Friday June 10th, and the fry quit dying. Did water changes and treated per the protocol. Lost about 3,000 fry total. Then Thursday June 16th, found 20 dead fry. Scraped and scoped 5 fry and found nothing, treated with Proform anyway. I was too late. Lost about 1500 more fry over the weekend that were already over the edge. This darn costia is kicking my butt, about the time you relize you've got it, its too late.

No fry losses in the 50% domestic tank. It looks like I have quite a few Asagi in that tank. Im very anxious to see them develop.

Im scraping and scoping almost daily. A few fry are dying, mainly deformed ones. Koi are big enough that I could get pumps going. I made window screen intakes to keep out the smaller ones. Got my 3,000gph pump running. Water is cleared upclear and healthy. Got about 50 tobies, some as large as 3". Mostly ogons. 1 of the tobis I have an eye on is a really nice Ochiba. Another is a nice kohaku.

I have been culling also. Removed about 1000 pure white, solid orange, and kohaku to separate tanks. Focusing on keeping more of the sankes, showas, and metallic koi. Looks like the spawn was 30% or more kohaku. So probably leave those males out of the mix next time.

I'll post some pictures when I get a chance. Still getting caught up at work.

[Jackie Ramo]

Hope you had a nice time away. Sorry the fish are still giving you problems. Post us some pics when you get a chance. BTW how are the aquariam guys doing?

[Terri]

Nice post RAT :grin:

Greg, glad you got a break... body and mind needs it every so often. Sorry to hear the fry are still not doing well. Ditto Jackie though, would love to see some pics.

[GregBickal]

Took some pictures last night. I will try to post them this weekend. Lots of korky koi in there. Deformed heads mostly. Lots of messed up gill plates. Found one koi that looked like a Celestial goldfish. Big flat head, eyes pointing up. Weird. I guess thats what you get when you inbreed too much :roll: I didn't get a picture of him tho.

I caught a couple of little ochibas with nice patterns. Both had messed up gill plates. Dang. Took pictures, but then tossed them in the grass.

Been trying to catch the 3"+ Tobis and not having much luck. I hate to have to seine the tank cause it stresses all the little ones that cant work around the net so easy.

As for my aqaurium at work. Ive lost 2 koi from it while I was gone on vacation. I think they got a little over-fed while I was gone :roll: Otherwise they are doing awsome. Its time for them to get thinned out.

[Jackie Ramo]

Well I guess mother nature has to provide food and making deformed babies does it... One hopes there are a few nice ones in there Greg!!!

[GregBickal]

Except mother nature got it backwards. My bad luck is all the larger koi are these Elephant man square head looking things that have grown much bigger than there siblings, and now they are eating the good koi. OUCH.

Took out about 10 of them last night. Very easy to spot in the water. The shape of the gills give them a reflective quality to them. Usually the head is slightly bigger on one side and crooked to the body.

I have seen goldfish before where poor water quality rolls the gill covers, and Im wondering if some of these deformities were from water quality, or the costia, or something else preventable.

[Tamianth]

Greg,
I have a note on my sheet from the wet lab that say's if formalin does not clear Costia easily, then Hexamita may be involved. Medication is Metradinathol (sp?) Not sure if I spelt that correctly when I made the note.

Not sure if thats helpful or not......

[Swamprat]

Except mother nature got it backwards. My bad luck is all the larger koi are these Elephant man square head looking things that have grown much bigger than there siblings, and now they are eating the good koi. OUCH.

Took out about 10 of them last night. Very easy to spot in the water. The shape of the gills give them a reflective quality to them. Usually the head is slightly bigger on one side and crooked to the body.

I have seen goldfish before where poor water quality rolls the gill covers, and Im wondering if some of these deformities were from water quality, or the costia, or something else preventable.

Rolled gills...hmmmm. I've seen it from flukes, especially flukiated tosai... it curves the plate and they never grow out of it.

[GregBickal]

Here's a few that got culled... I am finding alot like the 3rd picture. Gill covers really messed up. Im not sure if this is a problem from the paracites or just the inbreeding. I am not finding this problem with my half-breeds.

It really sucks to see a really nice koi, then find the lower left gill slightly messed up. Dang, throw it into the grass... :roll:

Another common deformity is the tail stop seems to be thicker on one side than the other. I can recall where I saw a post about that before.

They were flashing again last night so I dosed them with Proform C again. I have been dosing 150mil per 1000 gallons. This time I upped it to 200ml per 1000 gallons. Ive only found costia (no flukes) in this tank. Seems like it takes the costia a week after a treatment to get back to a point where it starts affecting the fry. No deaths since I started treating with the Proform C once a week.

[Jackie Ramo]

Getting to be expensive dosing once a week... sorry to hear that. Mother nature makes lots of mistakes, the reason a healthy baby is considered a miracle is because so much can go wrong.

[GregBickal]

Yep, expensive medicine. I just ordered another 520ml of Supaverm... OUCH..

I am very glad that I kept the tank of half breeds. By observing them versus the pure breed fry, I am definetly seeing the difference in genetic. Hardly any deformities in the half breed pond. Didnt loose any to this costia problem. They are not as pretty, I can definetly see the difference in skin quality and color.

I'll try to bowl up some fish and get pictures for comparison.

[Jackie Ramo]

Interesting Greg. Yes some pics would be nice.

Maybe the Japanese have done to koi what the rest of the world did to dogs by inbreeding them so much the health problems are enormous with most purebred stock. Certainly goldfish are suffering at the hands of breeders. Some of those things are just nasty looking.

[GregBickal]

Some pictures for you guys. These are the largest 2 tobi. The squares in the picture are 1".

[GregBickal]

Some Ochiba

[GregBickal]

Ok, now some from the domestic tank (perish the thought I know).

Looks like quite a few of the koi in the domestic tank have doitsu scales (perish the thought again). First koi is a doitsu with a red belly. The koi with the black spots on their heads are all doistu also. Possibly from my Shusui female. Third koi could be matsuba.

[Jackie Ramo]

Greg, those Japanese tobi are the fattest fry I have ever seen!!! Look at the width of their tails !wow! If you did say the squares were one inch, one would think these guys were much bigger. But even the other ones are fat!!! Some nice looking ones there as well. We can all think so until Luke comes back and corrects us anyway.

I like the ones with the black tancho. Wonder if it will stay...

Although its been a long hard road for you I do hope you are finding the experience worthwhile.

[GregBickal]

I raised goldfish for the first 4 years of my ponding experience. THat tobi was so fat, I thought it was a goldfish. I had to actually check it for barbles :grin: They have been eating plenty of their brothers.

The thing I dont like is seeing a koi with a nice pattern, then only to find a defect on it. One of the larger ochibas has a defect on its lower left gill plate.

I focused mainly on ochibas for this set of pictures. Next time I'll try to catch some kohakus.

It is a very rewarding experience, thats why I do it, and thats exactly what makes it so hard, when something takes that reward away from you.

Pictures from the end of the season are going to be fun Comparisons.