Breeding Koi For Money | Forget It
Breeding Koi For Money
I am always intrigued by the koi market participants and was prompted to write these few words following a request for information from a pond keeper who had a record "crop" of koi and was looking for possible buyers She could not seem to find anyone.
Koi are wonderful fish that genuinely make real pets. They quickly learn to feed from your hand and recognize you immediately you get close to the pond.
For 99.999% of pond keepers that's all the koi will ever be ... wonderful pets. Pets also cost money and do not make money for their owners.
Dealers are not shy to encourage the view that money can be made from koi keeping. These self same dealers are happy to sell you fish at high prices but never seem to want to buy fish back from you even at low prices. Have you even come across this phenomenon?
*****Build your pond to enjoy the hobby ... forget making money
Aquatic Plants Gone Wrong ...
I went to the Kruger National Park and discovered a very interesting fact about a "marginal aquatic" plant that is creating a potentially devastating impact upon crocodile populations.
I don't think many of you have crocodiles in your pond but this is a fascinating story for anyone interested in ecology as all pond keepers are I am sure. The story concerns an invasive riverside plant called the Triffid Weed (Chromolaena odorata) which originates in South America.
The sex of unborn crocodiles is apparently determined by the egg temperature during the incubation period. The cooler the temperature then the greater the ratio of females to males and vice versa. It is possible therefore to get a complete clutch of either female or male crocodiles. A significant impact on this ratio can be made by as little as a change of between 1 and 2 degrees Fahrenheit (0.5 to 1 degrees C). The incubation temperature for almost all crocodiles wherever they live is close to 30 degrees Centigrade (86 F).
In the Lake St Lucia region of Eastern South Africa the accidental introduction of Triffid Weed is creating a situation where traditional crocodile nesting sites are now experiencing more shade and therefore lower incubation temperatures.
*****The result is high ratios of female to male hatchlings which is threatening to wipe out crocodiles in that region. No it is not April 1st and the threat is being taken very seriously. Read more about this at http://www.issg.org/features/chromolaena.html
On our trip it was fascinating to observe larger fish catching smaller fish in the shallows of rivers at night ... what a life these fish must lead. Of course the crocodiles fed on the larger fish as we also witnessed.
Back to pond keeping now. Warm Water and Oxygen In Ponds
Western Europe has experienced record temperature levels and a number of people have reported gasping fish so I thought i would once again bang my oxygen drum. You will know by now my belief that any pond should contain 3 things .... water, oxygen and fish.
When water temperatures are high as they have been then a serious reduction of oxygen levels takes place in any water course for the simple unavoidable reason that water dissolves less oxygen as water temperatures increase. You can only do your best to compensate for this by ensuring your waterfall is working and that you also run a spray-type fountain. Of course if you have an air pump and air stones then keep the air pump running morning, noon and night.
Water at 25 degrees C can hold only 89% of the oxygen that water at 20 degrees can hold. At 30 degrees oxygen is depleted by about 20%. This is a great deal when seen from the perspective of the the fish and the bacteria in your biofilter. In fact because dissolved oxygen content is lower the biofilter works less well which creates more of a strain on the pond system.
At higher land elevations as in large parts of South Africa, and in places like the Rockies the problem is made even worse because oxygen concentrations are also influenced by air pressure. At about 5,000 feet above sea level water holds about 8% less oxygen than at sea level.
As I have said many times you cannot add too much oxygen to your pond. Waterfalls are essential I believe in any pond.
3. Thinking of Winter Yet?
Most of the readers of this Gazette live in USA and Europe. Of course Winter is still quite a time away but is a good time to become prepared by at least helping your fish to put on a bit of weight in preparation for the long Northern Hemisphere winters. Provide them with some extra high quality fish food although in conjunction with the high temperatures above there has possibly been a bonanza of insect life for your pond fish to eat this year.
This year by the way make a point of NOT buying wheatgerm for winter feeding. Save money and help your fish at the same time. I will cover this in a later edition.
One reader has already posed an interesting Wintertime question. She informed me that she will place her fish in a small pond in the attic during the winter because of the fact that her pond freezes over. The attic is not heated and she wanted to know my views on biofilters in this situation. My answer was that even if the temperature is low and little food would be fed it is still a good idea to run the biofilter .... the fish after all still naturally excrete nitrogen compounds (ammonia) although in much lower amounts.
The fundamental reason behind this is that the fish must be kept as stress free as possible ready for that new spring when diseases start to take a hold and create serious problems for pond fish.
By running the biofilter it also never dies and as such does not need to be restarted next year. Your pond gets off to a great start this way.
Peter J May is an expert on aquatic plants and pond environments and his advice for aquatic plants at this time of the year is as follows. By the way do yourself a great favour and subscribe to Peter's Chronicles at http://www.perfect-pond-detective.com Peter is a great and entertaining writer ... you will enjoy what he always has to say.
This section is quoted from Peter's latest Chronicles
"Now September is a time for clearing off decaying vegetation . Some of the marginals could have been cut back to one third and may have flowered again.
You can collect offcuts from the plants if you want to propagate them. Just pull them off or cut them neatly as they emerge from a basket. If they have developed root hairs then they will be guaranteed to establish in any good heavy loam set in a well-drained pot sitting in about 2inches, 5cm of water.
It may be time to replace tired and overgrown plants in the marginal baskets next month, so these will be a useful replacement.Lilies should be the main attraction now along with the Fringe lily, Nymphoides peltata. A few bog plants like the Ligularias, the Lobelias and Astilbes may be putting on a show. This is when the robust foliage plants like the Hostas, Rheums, Peltiphyllum and Petasites come into their own."
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