[Carloskoi]

is there an ideal winter low temp to strive for if you could control the temp?

i know people say you shouldn't feed your fish for a few weeks in the winter no matter what your winter low. why?

my winter low last year was 59. i do have a heater that i did not use last winter to see what the temps were.

i know part of the reason people say is so the females reabsorb eggs. why is that a good thing? it seems that is just a response to starvation and the starving males don't have eggs to resorb. if i have males and females in my pond, and i do, like most of us, won't they spawn if they are healthy and well fed and isn't that a good thing. as long as they eat all the eggs of course, i don't want any little shitagoi swimming around in the pond.

do wild carp in their indiginous steams fast for a few weeks? or do they just eat less and maybe a different diet? what is the diet of carp anyway?

i was at a koi club party last night and the topic turned to fasting. no one could give me a real good reason except that i didn't want food rotting in their gut. our temps don't get that low. someone else said feeding will lead to ulcers but i never got a mechanism for why that would be so. maybe poor filter leading to increased aeromonas bacterial counts in the water.

anyway, main questions are why fast if temps are higher and what is the IDEAL winter low?

Carl