[ootyboy]

Hi,

After months of construction my 8,500 concrete gallon pond is finally up and running. I have added a few fish to start the nitrogen cycle from my old pond. I also followed the advice of Koivet.com, and used the method to expedite the pond cycling by adding "dirty" water from my existing filter that I have had running for about 2 years on a 1000 gallon pond.

However, I have 2 questions:

1. After 1 week with about 4 Koi in the pond (total of 30") I am noticing a small spike in Ammonia. Nitrite is still 0 PPM. My question is should I add Salt to alleviate the Ammonia?

2. I live in San Francisco/Bay Area and I started my pond in the dead of winter -- although our winter is perhaps a lot milder than most. It gets to about 30 F at night and around 55-60 F during the day.
My question is this: Does it take longer for a pond to cycle in cold weather than in warmer climates? Since the Koi are not feeding is it a good time to move them all to the new pond?

Details on Filteration:
8500 Gallon Concrete Pond -- coated with Epoxy resin
1 Aqua Ultima 10,000 Pressure Filter
1 BioSys 18 biological filter
2 Bottom drains
1 no niche skimmer
ESS8500 Pump

The other question is do I have enough filteration for keeping a rather light Koi load?

Thanks in advance for any help in this matter.