Asagi Breeding 2004

[dick benbow]

Hi Mike,
I have to be honest with you on the asagi. I don't know if the red receeds or not, I have never bred them before and when I studies with kentaro
we dealt with gosanke. my gut instincts is it stays and gets worse. Since you have seen them when they are white with no pattern at the dealers at least you know what we're shooting for! The showa have a brown cast to them but that's because the red plate is over the black. It becomes more evident in two months.

[dick benbow]

Today I spent selecting sanke and sizeing kohaku. The sanke brood looks fantastic and I'm excited to see if i have another pair that will become proven. At this age you select the koi with the yellow heads and all black bodies. They do not look like sanke. That comes slowly. I bet I had only 1% other. The toby kohakus are up to half inch now. I must have gotten 100 removed. I also divided the longfins in half for better growth and found half a dozen big dragon fly larva wandering around in their pens. Not quite so stiff and sore tonight. Brought another 5 gal bucket back of blueberries. Have to sign off here and get them vacuum sealed and frozen.

[jacovors]

Thanks Dick,
I really appreciate all the info you give away freely that sometimes is so hard to come by ( trade secrets).
I am glad you had such a good Sanke spawning.
That pic you send of you're new Asagi took my breath away,very very nice. I for one do not like Asagi but can easily be turned with one like that in my pond.
What I have found with last years spawn was that I got plenty Sanke fry with yellow heads and black bodies but most of them turned out to be spotted mongrels and the ones with white mouths were few and far between.Funny how the mongrels always grows best.
Thanks again,
Jaco

[estanque_koi]

Hellow Dick,
congratulations for your breeding activities, and thank you for posting the pictures. I'm very interesting in breeding, is fascinating watch the fry as they develop.
I'm trying to breed Sanke, got a spawn from a female and three males. All of them Sanke, well, one male is metallic Sanke.
Almost 50 % of the fry are fully black or black with either light yellow or orange head (some metallic) or dark colour, kinda chagoi.
From previous year spawn (same female, but unfortunately a yamabuki ogon male also contributed), I know almost for sure al these blacks or black with coloured head will not turn up Sanke. Mines are developing like some kind of karasugoi. Still have to check the only two of them that I keep from last year in an outdoor pond (if they have survived water snakes...)
Besides, this year I got fry (now ranging from 3 to 6 cm) that already show a developing Sanke coloration and pattern.
So your comment on selecting koi with yellow head and black body caught my interest. Maybe I'm wrong and culled just fry worth to keep? Could you post some pic of these young koi? Do you know when do they start changing that pattern to a Sanke-like pattern?
All the best,
Diego (Cordoba, Spain)

Today I spent selecting sanke and sizeing kohaku. The sanke brood looks fantastic and I'm excited to see if i have another pair that will become proven. At this age you select the koi with the yellow heads and all black bodies. They do not look like sanke. That comes slowly. I bet I had only 1% other. The toby kohakus are up to half inch now. I must have gotten 100 removed. I also divided the longfins in half for better growth and found half a dozen big dragon fly larva wandering around in their pens. Not quite so stiff and sore tonight. Brought another 5 gal bucket back of blueberries. Have to sign off here and get them vacuum sealed and frozen.

[dick benbow]

Wow, It's gonna be a tough one to get to the berry farm this weekend. I have all kinds of other activities planned. But I will see if I can get some shots so you can see. I'm sure jason will back me on a shot or two. I usually select the yellow headed black bodies babies at 10 days and within a month or two they start to look more sanke like with kohaku patterns and black showing.
Diego, Sound like atleast this year you have a chance to get something more true to form than last year! I'll see what I can do!

[dick benbow]

Made my trek to the blueberry farms this morning so have a few tails.
last time I separated the kohakus into two groups and was surprised how the toby (bigger) group is growing. they're catching up with the sanke babies quick. another month and should begin to discern pattern.
Picked up a new kohaku breeder from Sakai-hiroshima's jumbo stock.
won't be able to use her till next year but was a find anyway.
i emailed jason some pics of the sanke babies so you can get an idea of what they look like when you cull at two weeks. After this look, yellow heads, black bodies, the black rolls back into groups and the kohaku pattern starts to be known. the koi in the pics are just over an inch and a quarter.
the last sanke pair tried to sneak anopther spawning in didn't work for whatever reason. looks like the ochibas are the last spawn for the year. babies up to about 3/8th of an inch.
Checked on the asagi babies. don't see that they're growing all that much. when i was pulling tobys you could see the difference. Now all are tobys and it's harder to see the growth. feed them a bunch of bloodworms today as a treat. the little ones have haldf the worm in thier mouth and the other half trailing along side their head. half and hr later and all are disppeared from sight and the little gut on those babies looks like they swallowed a pea! look like little sumo wrestlers! lol!
It surprising how fast the time goes during the day. get about half the things done that needs doing and it's time to go home! I love it tho!
Getting excited to go to the portland show! JR will be head judge and will stop and see my friend arthur at sunset koi who has a hosokai asagi I want to check on. Life is good albeit busy!!!!!

[JasonS]

Here are the photos.

[dick benbow]

Thanks Jason for posting!

[MikeM]

Dick: What can you share about how sanke with black noses at that size develop? After the baby sumi fades away, does the sumi come back on their head in later years? Neat little guys.

[Bancherd]

Thanks! I would not mind that kind of work(temporary)!