Another Shiro Utsuri - Comments

[Dan Blatt]

Shiro Utsuri - 15 inch, Breeder Marudo. Unsure of sex. Comments welcome. Anyone familiar with Marudo shiro's and their traits? Any speculation on sex from body shape or finnage?

[MikeM]

Based on lateral view, looks like it could be "she", but not certain. Pecs are also kind of "in-between" . From the pics, I'd guess female if I had to choose. I like the pattern & think it will become more balanced as sumi comes up on the head and shoulder. Can't tell about quality of sumi. I know nothing about Marudo, except supposedly trained at Dainichi (isn't that about a quarter of the name breeders ... either the head of the family or their kids?) ... you need MikeP!

[l113892]

Dan-

I am a big, big fan of Marudo. However, I was not aware that he breed Shiro Utsuri, at least not that it was a focus variety for him. Mark Gardner pointed out to me that he breed Yamabuki Ogon(Izumiya parents) so Mark might know something about his shiro utsuri breeding stock. Shiro Utsuri has no bloodline as such so there may not be a lot of information you can get. I guess there is also the possibility that this shiro utsuri was produced as the result of a Showa spawning but again I don't know about Marudo utsuri. I will visit Mr. Hirasawa in October and I'll know for sure then.

Mike

[Dan Blatt]

Mike P - you are probably right in assuming it's a result of a showa spawning. What struck me when I read your post was that when I was viewing this utsuri, it was in with a lot of other Marudo koi, same age and size - primarily showa's. Two other shiro utsuri's were in this group, one a gin rin and another one similar to this one but with a very faded, almost non-existent maruten hi marking on the head area. Anyway raises that possibility. The white on this particular utsuri (pictured above) is extremely nice and the pattern's potential is promising. Just for the fun of it, here's a showa that ended up in the net with the shiro in the bowling process. Thought it was worthy of a photo. Same size 15 inch.

[l113892]

Dan-

I received a response from Adam Strysik. Adam spent two months with the Yagenji family this past summer. Yagenji breeds both showa and shiro utsuri. See Adam's comments relating to shiro utsuri from a showa spawning.

"Mike
Yes. We kept a lot of them. The same applied for Gin Rin Showa and keeping GR Shiro. I don't think many of these were kept all winter, and even fewer of these Shiros w/ Showa parents will be kept as nissai(maybe
none of them), but...at the stages I was culling, we kept everything of a certain quality level that could potentially be sold in the future. So many "tategoi" don't look good by the next cull so a whole lot of
them have to be kept. Still, I doubt that any of Yagenji's Nissai, Sansai, and up are from showa parents. The Shiros with Showa parents are kept with their showa brothers/sisters in the concrete ponds for the winter and are not mixed in with the Shiro/Shiro parented Shiros. I'd imagine that by spring, they keep only the best of the best Shiros out of the
Shiro/Shiro parented ones, and then lump all the remaining ones together with the "other" shiros to sell for wholesale.
On the flip side, a few showas are kept from Shiro culling(only a select few with the proper quality) and many tancho showas. By the 3rd culling, the number of tanchos in the Shiro ponds is lessened by 1/2 compared
to the first cull. In the end, few Showas and few tancho showas are kept from Shiro parents. Then again....thats how we did it at Yagenji...maybe not the same elsewhere."
Later
Adam

[markgardner]

Sorry, can't shed any light on the matter as to whether Marudo breeds shiro utsuri from shiro utsuri parents.

I know that Momotaro kept a lot of shiro utsuri from showa spawns in line with the Yagenji info above.

[dick benbow]

Mike P,
thanks for forwarding on adam's comments are simbetsu. it was interesting!

[Dan Blatt]

Mike - thanks for the informative information. Appreciate it!

[Dan Blatt]

Took a better photo of the shiro today.