Useful Items to have on hand

Koi pond maintenance is not too hard but I've found a few items that come in handy.  

A salt meter; these are very useful if you want to handle any koi health issues your self. Salt will kill most parasites, but sometimes you need to up the dose for the out of control parasites, you can tell if you have too much salt in your pond because the plants will burn. This will not mean that you are hurting the koi however. Remove the plants if you need to dose at a high rate. A strong dose of salt is a meter reading of 0.3 but for really sick koi a short time in 0.6 is very effective. A high dose should be reach gradually, we are trying to safe the koi not shock them. You can dip them in a salt bath of 0.6 for about 10 minutes, and then put them back in the pond or you can bring the whole pond up to that level. A 0.3 is very effective and should be a good place to start.

A ph tester or a ph test kit;  is good to have around you should know what your ph level is that comes out of your water supply (hose or well). If you fill a new pond up and find that your ph is above 7 don't worry is will disapate in about 24 hrs. It still may be higher but most koi are perfectly happy in a pond that is a little high and do get used to it after a while.

An Ammonia test kit or meter;  also good to have on hand. This will allert you to ammonia spikes and keep your koi from suffering the effects of ammonia burn. 

Other things that you may end up with might be ; A koi net, a pond net, Plant helpers; trimmers or retrievers, fertilizer and fertilizer applicators. 

 Koi Health| Keeping your Koi Healthy

  

Koi are hardy fish if you are a little protective of them, don't let them freeze, don't let them starve and don't let them be a meal for a predator.  That seem like the same things we would do for any of our other pets. Koi can get sick many different ways, introducing new fish to  their water, excess stress, injuries and dirty water. That's just a few.

Most problems that koi get are not deadly to them in the beginning, but untreated it can lead to their death. a small abrasion on a koi can go either way, the best thing to do is keep on eye on the koi and make sure it's not changing, except geting better, and your koi are eating and swimming like normal. We always treat with salt, this is un-iodinized with no rust inhibitors. This is the first step it helps build up their stres coat and pretty much burns of any unwanted parasites and kind of cauterizes the sore or abrasion. We put rock salt in a nylon and hang it in or waterfall or stream, it just disinigrates into the pond.

Allowing too much fish waste, leave food or any other organic material to build up in the pond will make the Ammonia level rise to deadly levels. This can burn the koi's lungs and they will have a hard time recovering if they ever do.  A filter is great, but a filter can only handle some of the problem. Normally a filter helps keep ammonia levels in check but overload is a problem. The water may need to be changed, just about a fourth at first especially if you have city water with chlorine, Koi are sensitive to chlorine.

After you have koi for a while you will be able to tell if a koi is in some kind of distress, they will be listless, their color may lack luster and they will just look miserable. Other signs can be gasping at the surface, jumping out of the water and rubbing against any thing thy can find. Most problems will happen just after purchase, so keep a good eye on your new koi, its just the stress of shipping, netting, hankling, traveling and being over crowded that make their stress levels elevate, and when The koi's stress coat is thin eveyrthing attacks them, and they have little protection. When you put a new koi in your pond try touching it's skin and see if it is rough feeling, or if it's slimy. If it is rough or dry feeling watch that koi closely for a while.

Koi

Koi are not a carp? Or are they? This is a good question. Some people say they are and some say they are not. I’ve read many book on Koi and they say that a koi in a carp. Some carp in the beginning had red and blue mutations, these koi were selected to begin the long road to the beautiful koi we have today.  The first wild carp were widely eaten by the Japan.  They were first bred in the year 1820 and by 1870 the red and white (Kohaku) variety was perfected. Many of the other varieties that we see today were developed by the 1930’s, and new varieties are still being developed today.  It’s easy to understand why when we build our first pond and get our first koi how we end up with to many fish for our pond.  I know from experience that too many koi in one pond will keep the koi from reaching their full growth potential.  That’s not to say that they still can’t get quite large anyway.  But if you ever go to a gardening store or landscape place and they have a pond, they are keeping the koi for visitors to enjoy and they usually only keep a few koi in the pond, if they have been their for a few years the will be quite large.

Koi have been said to live to be 250 years old, with no really documentation. One documentation has been 90 years. I guess that means that you better think about putting your fish in your will!! Just a little fun history, did you know that Hitler had koi and he just loved them. Lucky for them they were not discovered by the Jews!!