Going to look at Koi today at 4:30 MT

[pecan]

I looked in our local classifieds and found a guy about a mile from me who breeds and sells Koi. He has 6"-8" butterfly for $20.00!!! He says he has thousands and they are in an outdoor pond.

I figured if I decided to get Koi it would be best to look locally so the water temps would be the same and the PH would be similar (our area of the country has generally high ph in all ponds).

All I have are comets right now is there anything I should know about picking them out and moving them?

Thanks!
I am very excited!!!

 

[j.w]

Sounds like a good price for koi. I don't have any idea tho on how to choose koi as I only have the goldies. Hope you find some pretty ones..............that's all I would be looking for. I love those butterfly ones and the way they flow through the pond like royalty!

 

[pecan]

Well I just got home and this guy had an amazing set up! He has a home based business and lives at the top of a gully. His back yard slopes very steep down. He had probably 30,000 gallons worth of water back there! A huge deep pond about 10,000 gallons, another smaller pond about 3,000 gallons with a water feature, a large deep pond in his front yard probably 5,000 gallons and two tanks that he sells out of that are 5,000 gallons each. He had a massive filtration tanks and all his water was pristine.

I bought 4 little guys, 3 are about 6" and the 4th is about 8". $80 for the 4 of them, not bad...

Here they are

Anything you Koi folks can tell me about them would be cool Do you know what kinds they are?

The 2 white ones immediately began swimming together in my pond like they were life long buddies. I fed the comets and the 2 whites ones came up for a bite right after putting them in. The yellow guy and the little guy with the black back are hiding though.

 

[j.w]

That one fatter white one, I wonder if it's a female? Was he able to tell you the sexes? They sure are pretty w/ there long fins!

 

[fishin4cars]

the solid white is a platinum, the dark colored one is a doutsu, some refer to it as a blue doitsu because when young the have a blue hugh to them, the yellow is a kigoi, and the white withe the green COULD be a early developing Matsuba or it could change drastically, only time will tell with that one. Nice Koi!

 

[Sunshine]

Very nice additions. So pretty.

 

[sissy]

nice koi and I bought mine at a local ,well local as North Carolina about 25 minutes from my house .He has an amazing set up also but ony paid 4 to 6 dollars for mine because they were only a couple of inches long .They do grow fast though and had babies ,i wish I had known what I know now .I really like the white one the best ,he will really show up nice in the pond night and day .The one that looks white and grey and sorta green too must be a female for sure .

 

[JenH]

I'm jealous you got such a great price for a bigger fish!! I got mine today and they were $15 and are only about 3-4", guessing since I didn't try to measure them. That was the cheapest I could find locally, others were $30 for the same size. These are not considered premium either.

 

[addy1]

Beautiful fish you picked up! If I had koi it would butterfly ones.

 

[koiguy1969]

nice picks on the fish.... very pretty! looks like they all should grow out nicely. i may get a butterfly myself one of these days. i havent had one yet...they look so graceful as they glide thru the water.i could be wrong, (wouldnt be the first time) but i dont think they can swim quite as fast or have the agility of standard finned koi. making them easier targets for preditors.

 

[pondlover]

Pecan those are beautiful. I have one that looks like the Doutsu. Larkin how on earth did you learn all the different names of Koi. So far, I can tell a butterfly from a standard. I do love the flowing fins on butterfly.

 

[CountryEscape]

PL, if you were interested in buying koi and starting searching them on Ebay, you would soon learn, too. I have a cheat sheet! And, it's Doitsu, Larkin won't mind that I'm correcting his spelling. LOL On my cheatsheet, Doitsu means "scaleless or mirror". Matsuba means "pine cone pattern". I think the dark colored one looks like he/she is a matsuba maybe. The platinum (white) one is all one color, so you could add the word "ogon", which means one color. Ki means yellow, but not sure what the "goi" means. This is like medical terms. The words mean different things, then you can put them together to describe the fish's color, scale, color pattern, etc. It becomes kind of fun. The bad thing, though, is that sometimes there are some sellers on Ebay that describe their koi, and it doesn't make sense. Maybe they post the wrong pics!
Anyhow, your fish are very beautiful, and you picked them, so they will be special! Also, you picked all with white fins, which Larken told me when I was looking at fish that the white fins will show up much better than clear ones, and he's definitely right about that! Enjoy your new babies! Yes, I agree the light gray/green one looks prego, or maybe it was just the biggest hog!
Oh, and there is a koi website that I really like as far as seeing pics of the fish and reading the description of the color patterns, etc. Someone gave this to me, and I enjoy looking at the colors and patterns. Here it is: http://www.coloradokoi.com/taishosanke.htm

 

[fishin4cars]

Good catch CE, my bad. lol That's what I did/do as well. I have a few books, I have my sheet sheets, and I constantly watch ebay to see what attracts me to certain fish. Each person will find things that attract them. I myself have found a great fondness to smotth scale koi, I also like vivid clear cut lines between colors. Those are some nice butterflys, I think the white/platinum will be the one that stands out the most as they grow. But at the same time it may or maynot be the friendliest. If one that doesn't really stand out becomes the most tame it will soon become one of your favorites. One of our dullest looking fish is by far the friendliest and everyone even the kids know it is Lucky. Koguy, If you've never had a butterfly koi i highly recommend one. yes they are a little more susceptable to predators, BUT they usually don't grow quite as large body wise as standards, and they don't seem to be as hard on plants either. they also have more of a calming effect to them which seems to help relax the rest of the group. Lucku is our calming fish for sure. It's our largest or close to it right now. it's a chagoi which is suppose to be a calmer koi as well, and being he's a butterfly it really makes him standout and yet still one of the must subtle fish in the pond.

 

[koiguy1969]

ive looked at them alot of times...just never got one...& it would add to my selection of fish for customers too. i have had people ask about them !

 

[addy1]

ive looked at them alot of times...just never got one...& it would add to my selection of fish for customers too. i have had people ask about them !

Well get building your butterfly koi pond!