What's maiming my koi fish?

[TheGoodDr]

Hi everybody.. New to this forum... So frustrated just recently started.... I've found a couple koi fish badly maimed, head with 3 or more inches of body floating in the pond and alive! but the rest of it is gone! What is doing this? Why would something go thru the trouble to catch my fish and then leave almost half of it? And they are always left in the pond and never laying outside the pond!? So the catching and killing and maiming and eating of the other half must be happening "in the pond"?! Seems so odd! My pond is big and probably 5 feet deep? Heron? Coon? Cat? It's always at night! Thks

 

[TheGoodDr]

this is what my dead fish always look like! Why would something catch my koi only to leave this much behind???

 

[DoDad]

I would say raccoon or otter.

 

[peter hillman]

If at night you can rule out Heron. But strange when coons killed my fish they left they partial bodies OUTSIDE the pond not in.

 

[DoDad]

A Heron doesn't feed like that.

 

[morewater]

Definitely a raccoon. Raccoons seem to like the "sport" of catching fish. They'll sometimes each a bit of one, discard what's left, catch another one, etc., etc. They're destructive little beasts. The only good raccoon is one that's taking a dirt nap in the centre lane. As you can see from my profile, I'm the President of Raccoon Haters International. I think I'm also the only member in this otherwise exclusive cabal.

 

[peter hillman]

Definitely a raccoon. Raccoons seem to like the "sport" of catching fish. They'll sometimes each a bit of one, discard what's left, catch another one, etc., etc. They're destructive little beasts. The only good raccoon is one that's taking a dirt nap in the centre lane. As you can see from my profile, I'm the President of Raccoon Haters International. I think I'm also the only member in this otherwise exclusive cabal.

I would love to be an associate member of your club, I hate coons as well.

 

[HARO]

As you can see from my profile, I'm the President of Raccoon Haters International. I think I'm also the only member in this otherwise exclusive cabal.

I don't know how you got to be president, I STARTED the club!!!
John

 

[Faebinder]

I don't care whose the president, I'm in the club too.

This is a raccoon or otter behavior IMO. Happened to my pond too but they left it outside. My fish looked just like yours, they left me the tail. It was left outside the pond. I wonder if your attacker is an otter.

They will be back. Start putting a net and when spring comes set up an electric fence.

 

[Smaug]

I've never seen coons catch fish in deep water. Mink yes

 

[DoDad]

How deep is your pond around the edges?

 

[Faebinder]

I've never seen coons catch fish in deep water. Mink yes

That's what I meant, minks not otter. A otter outta know what an otter outta know.

 

[DoDad]

In my years of ponding more otters kill more koi than mink around here.
If a coon can walk into the water they can kill fish no matter how deep it is.
My small pond is 4 1/2 feet at the edge so I don't worry about coons but herons, osprey and eagles are my worries.
My large bond has raised sides so no worries about coons herons or otters. It's the eagles an osprey ther.

 

[Dave 54]

Looking at your fish I'd say you had an otter problem however where there lots of other bodies found at the same time ?
If its otters they tend to go into over kill and leave both live and dead fish all with horrible injuries like the ones your seeing here .

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/hea...gue-mammal-munches-10k-worth-of-koi-carp.html

Your best bet is to get a camera on the pond to see who your night time visitor is , then plan some course of action .

Dave

 

[Smaug]

Op doesn't mention a geographic location but otters are not very common in most of the US while mink are.