FredrikAnderson
Koi Herder
I found some baby fry ( you call all baby fish that right? correct me if I am wrong please) in my pond 3 days ago. I had just won a 4" butterfly koi the day before so there was no chance of them belonging to the koi (both to small and not in there nearly long enough). I had 4 goldfish ranging from about 6 to 9 inches in there and 3 misquito eaters or minos ( I will refer to as ME from here on out) that I put in the pond at its start to keep the misquito larva in check. I was planning to remove the ME ( prior to the discovery of the fry and so more ME wasn't something I was really interested in. Not knowing how to tell if they were goldfish or ME I decided to seperate them until I could know. I had a second skippy filter that I had plumbed in but hadn't put and filter media in yet so I converted it into a holding tank. I put some fine mesh over the out feed on the filter so that the fry wouldn't get out (Que the scary music). I figured I would have to clean it off regularly but it clogged much faster then I thought. I cleaned it before I went to sleep but it clogged durring the night and over flowed over the top of the skippy. I didn't have that filter withing the liner boundry so it drained out my 350 gallon pond to the point I had about 30 to 40 gallons left and my pump couldn't cerculate anything. The fry must have flowed out with the water. I caught my goldfish and put them into a large tote. I caught my koi and put her into a five gallon bucket. I put some water plants ontop of both for shade. I then filled my pond up with my hose and started to circulate the water through everything except my filter. I planned to put my fish back in the next day when the chlorine was gone and I could put my filter back on. My friend across the street brought me 3 more goldfish that night (he gave me the 4 and wanted to thin out his pond a little more). The fish that I already had despite the pond mishap seemed to be doing really well so he added them to the tote with the four. When I woke up I went to check on the fish and found 6 of the 7 goldfish belly up. The last gold fish wasn't doing very good and the koi didn't look that great either. I put both fish back into the pond and the good news is that it is now 2 days later and they seem to be doing pretty good but they are not that active. I think that the plants I had in the tote at night removed all the oxegen. I no longer have the ME anywere that I know of either.
On a brighter note: Yesterday I heard about someone giving away Koi on craigslist. So in the morning i used a new trashcan and a five gallon bucked to create a quarintine tank with a small skippy filter. I went and picked up 2 koi about 4" long and 3 small ones at about 1". I put them into the quaritine tank and well be watching them for 14 days to make sure everything is okey with them before I add them to my pond. Any suggestions for me at this point to make sure that I don't run into anymore issues or heaven forbid any more deaths?
On a brighter note: Yesterday I heard about someone giving away Koi on craigslist. So in the morning i used a new trashcan and a five gallon bucked to create a quarintine tank with a small skippy filter. I went and picked up 2 koi about 4" long and 3 small ones at about 1". I put them into the quaritine tank and well be watching them for 14 days to make sure everything is okey with them before I add them to my pond. Any suggestions for me at this point to make sure that I don't run into anymore issues or heaven forbid any more deaths?