Steps to maximize koi babies?

[rubyduby]

If you have enough cover (floating plants with roots like water lettuce, hyacinth, oxygenators like hornwort ect... your chances are good at leaving the fry in the pond and letting them grow up there. I started with 7 shubunkins 6 months ago and now have 7 adults and about 20 fry that are up to 3 inches already..(this is the second batch...I gave the first 23 back to the fish store). I think they do better in the pond. There will be no change in water parameters and they will get enough to eat with the algae and little water creatures (almost microscopic but if you shine a light on them at night you will see that the pond is full of them and the fry eat them which is better than fish food since it is a natural food source.) My adult fish never ate any of the fry...This is only my experience so far....Good luck with however you decide to raise them!

 

[Mmathis]

@rubyduby Agree!

 

[Abby]

If you have enough cover (floating plants with roots like water lettuce, hyacinth, oxygenators like hornwort ect... your chances are good at leaving the fry in the pond and letting them grow up there. I started with 7 shubunkins 6 months ago and now have 7 adults and about 20 fry that are up to 3 inches already..(this is the second batch...I gave the first 23 back to the fish store). I think they do better in the pond. There will be no change in water parameters and they will get enough to eat with the algae and little water creatures (almost microscopic but if you shine a light on them at night you will see that the pond is full of them and the fry eat them which is better than fish food since it is a natural food source.) My adult fish never ate any of the fry...This is only my experience so far....Good luck with however you decide to raise them!

Thank you so much for the suggestions and insight! I appreciate it!! How big are the fry to start?

 

[Mmathis]

Thank you so much for the suggestions and insight! I appreciate it!! How big are the fry to start?

I don’t know about koi, but for my goldfish, I called them “eyelashes,” because that’s what they looked like when they were newly hatched — eyelashes.

 

[Abby]

question… how big are koi hatchlings? Anyone have a pic of a brand new koi baby?

 

[mrsclem]

About twice the size as the eggs. You will see the eggs change color before they hatch. Unless you have them in a seperate tank, you probably wont see them till they are about 1/2" long. That's when mine start sneaking out from the plants.

 

[rubyduby]

If you have underwater lights in your pond the fry will swim towards them at night and you can get a good look, especially if you have some hornwort in front of the light for them to hide in. If not, shine a flashlight down into the pond at night unless you already have above pond lights. The fry have two big eyes on a skinny translucent body…another idea would be to raise a few in an aquarium for up close viewing and the rest in the pond….

 

[Abby]

About twice the size as the eggs. You will see the eggs change color before they hatch. Unless you have them in a seperate tank, you probably wont see them till they are about 1/2" long. That's when mine start sneaking out from the plants.

Thank you so much! did you feed them special food or did they survive on algae and natural occurring nutrients from the plants? Also I’ve seen a few posts of all the deformities that can happen… what has your experience been?

 

[mrsclem]

I tried raising some in a stock tank. They did not survive- mosquito larvae attacked them. Never tried feeding anything special for them. Only had a few that survived that had deformities, bent spines, missing fins.

 

[Mmathis]

question… how big are koi hatchlings? Anyone have a pic of a brand new koi baby?

Koi Spawning Behaviour & Development - Hydrosphere Water Gardens

Koi spawning behaviour occurs once per year, usually over a period of a few days. It begins when conditions such as water temperature, day length are right

www.pondexperts.ca

Not to sound rude, but Mr. Google is great resource.

 

[Abby]

I use it frequently before asking here… I found several websites that tell me size from one month On but couldn’t find anything Below that. Sorry for the questions, I mistakenly assumed that’s what the forum was for.

 

[mrsclem]

I agree, Google gives dozens of answers. No problem asking here from people who ha even thru this. Can't wait to see how long before you decide having koi babies is a good thing! Female koi can produce hundreds of thousands of eggs per pound of body weight! Excess koi are not easy to rehome.

 

[BKHpondcritters]

I had two females spawn last summer. June 12th to be exact. The first pictures I got of any of the fry were at the very beginning of July -

I did absolutely nothing special for them. Even now the ones we kept are still too small to eat the fish food I have, so they're making do on what they can scrounge up in the pond. I'm sure many were lost last year to our (at the time) resident water snake, as well as the numerous bullfrogs we have, and still this April we had to drain the pond to round them up & give away at least a couple dozen of the remaining fry. We also 'rehomed' three adult fish & kept three of the babies. I really hope we don't get any spawning this year (although I don't think we'll get that lucky) because if they do, we'll be paying someone once again next spring to round up those babies & take them away.

 

[Abby]

I agree, Google gives dozens of answers. No problem asking here from people who ha even thru this. Can't wait to see how long before you decide having koi babies is a good thing! Female koi can produce hundreds of thousands of eggs per pound of body weight! Excess koi are not easy to rehome.

Thank you so much for your kind and supportive response. I appreciate it!

 

[Abby]

I had two females spawn last summer. June 12th to be exact. The first pictures I got of any of the fry were at the very beginning of July -
View attachment 150674View attachment 150675View attachment 150676View attachment 150677

I did absolutely nothing special for them. Even now the ones we kept are still too small to eat the fish food I have, so they're making do on what they can scrounge up in the pond. I'm sure many were lost last year to our (at the time) resident water snake, as well as the numerous bullfrogs we have, and still this April we had to drain the pond to round them up & give away at least a couple dozen of the remaining fry. We also 'rehomed' three adult fish & kept three of the babies. I really hope we don't get any spawning this year (although I don't think we'll get that lucky) because if they do, we'll be paying someone once again next spring to round up those babies & take them away.

Thank you so much for your kind and supportive response. I appreciate it!