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THINK for YOURSELVES....
I've come to like a body shape...not quite as slim as the "Judge's Standard" but closer than it was a year ago. As A matter of fact I see koi all the time that have good color and pattern that i don't give a second look to because of their bad body shape.
Now that being said.....Why?
Why are bigger and bigger fish being the goal of a great number of breedrs?
a three foot koi is bigger than 99.99% of the hobbyists could put in their ponds and the pond and fish look aesthetically right. yet breeders are passed that standard and going on further.
The impetus comes form TWO directions, both which need to be addressed and corrections done to the method and dogma used to determine the GC (best Koi) at a show.
The first, the Farmer's veiw...when koi were just carp a bigger fish was ALWAYS better as it fed more people. In most farm animals BIGGER is better. When koi were being pulled out of a carp it was done by farmers. the first breeders were farmers, and the "Farmer" mentality of bigger is ALWAYS better was inherent to koi from the beginning. The farmer's Shows, koi or otherwise , have had Massive size as a criteria for winning.
the second, a Hobbyist veiw... a tosai; We can see the little dot or zip of color and the potential....each day the koi gets bigger; which is a good thing because then we can see the koi a bit better....appreciate the koi better.
For years the koi gets bigger, and as it does we can see it better and better and better.
And getting bigger means the hobbyist is keeping it alive, and that is an accomplishment in and of itself (which makes the hobbyist feel better on another level.).
And since these two positive things (the appreciation becomes easier, and we feel better about our husbandry skills) happen as our fish gets bigger we become conditioned to believe that Bigger is always better.
But after I understood this I came to the realization that the best fish at a koi show does not represent a fish 99.99% of the Koi hobbyists could appreciate in THEIR pond.
Biggness should become less significant once a koi reaches an acceptable size where its pattern. color, movement, and body shape can be fully appreciated.
A 26 inch koi that is perfect in every area IS a Fish that SHOULD beat a 33 inch fish that is insufficient in any of the areas of color, lustre, shape, movement, or pattern.
Size only matters to a point. Think.
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