| Ochiba breeding
I have been fiddling with breeding ochiba for some time, and have since given up in favour of trying showa. However I have bred a few nice ones, but from thousands of babies, only a few retained the colour, many got very dark and had to go.
I used a number of options over the years. Ochiba to ochiba is apparently not the way forward. I bred fron ginrin suragoi female to a male ochiba with some success, see one pic attached. this chap had the most beautiful copper coloured ginrin head, and great gin on the silver body. Sadly this one died in the growing on pond due to an algal bloom which sucked up all the oxygen and night, leaving me with about 10% deaths, and of course this chap was in with the losses.
Fur increased red in the colour, suragoi to kohaku. Graet for strong colour, but I am of the opinion that although the very reddish / copper ochiba are striking, a true light greenish / ochre fish , like the autumn leaves they represent, is still tops. Sadly they are hard to breed out of suragoi, and the slightest dark patches on the light colours will spoil the fish. They also seem sensitive to temperature over time, and also darken under certain water conditions, and can be ruined between one owner and the next.
Hence the value of a good ochiba specimen!
|