Speaking of Supply Side of Things

[B.Scott]

Akai-san
Grumpy once explained to me that a breeder may have 1000 tosai come out of the mud pond but only have room to over-winter 100. The remaining 900 are sold. If you want to buy koi the cheapest possible way you buy the lot at once for let us say $20,000 or if you want you can buy the best 100 of the 900 on offer and the price will be... $20,000. In truth you get the other 800 for free if you buy the lot. As you go down the line the fish become less and less valuable but it behooves the breeder to sell the lot in one go and be rid of them if he can. Most of these fish will be bought by middle-men who sell them on to dealers and garden-centers around the world.

Now the 100 that the breeder keeps are now Tatagoi. If you wish to buy one of these then you must pay a price based on what the breeder thinks this fish might be worth at some point down the line. Realize that $20,000 he recieved from the middle-man isn't going to come anywhere near covering the costs a breeder makes in the course of a season. The money need to come from his tatagoi. During the winter the dealer my sell 20-25 fish to customers and other dealers. Now he has 80 odd fish but come spring only has room for 40 in the mud pond. Now once again the fish are sorted and half of them become tatashita. (ta-tish-ta)

The tosai go into the mud-pond and in the fall they are once again judged. Many of the fish are males and automatically become tatashita. Other haven't lived up to expectations and also fall by the wayside. Out of the original 1000 we are now down to 15 fish. Next year it's the same and at the end of 5 years he might have only one fish from the whole original lot.

The thing to remember is that as you climb the mountain the air becomes thinner. The fish become better and more expensive. Even the fish that don't make the grade are most often better than the fish that were eliminated the year before. Every year that passes the quality increases ten fold. The last if left is often the very best of 1,000,000 fry that were hatched. Truly such a fish is one in a million.

Fish like this are not meant for everyone. Indeed, if you are a koi keeper with a proper pond, a Q-tank, a microscope, a good net and a hand full of test kits, you represent the elite of the hobby even though you might just be starting out. If you meet these requirements you are already in the top 5% of the hobby. The vast majority of people are of the "plastic filled hole with lilies and fish". They dump a pump in the pond and connect it to a magic black box filter. Maybe they have a 9w UV as well but they certainly never understand why their fish keep dying.

As you start building you pond remember that the pond itself is only the beginning. Just as important and often overlooked are all the extras I named above. I say extras but in fact they are essentials that shouldn't be over looked when budgeting for your new pond.

I think you should try to spend your money initially on outfitting these things rather than fish. In the beginning it is always better to have a few cheap fish to learn from. The first two to three years the learning curve can be quite steep especially if you don't have someone knowledgeable close at hand to walk you through the tricky bits.

B.Scott

[James P]

Very good post B.Scott.

[Akai-San]

Once again, I am speechless. Thanks B.Scott. Thanks to all. Now I have a solid goal to strive for. To try and be part of that top 5%. Believe it or not, I already priced a really good microscope....takai desu.

I have to say that all this planning, learning and conceptualizing is making me weak. I bought my first koi book, manual to nishikigoi at least 12 years ago. And every year I would pull it out and read the whole thing while looking at the grand champion pictures. Always wishing that someday, I would want koi like that in my pond. I'm finding out that this hobby is much like my other interest, Wine.

The knowledge and know-how all comes with time spent. The more wine you taste and assess, the more info. you can hypothesize for quality, pureness, and overall impression. I feel like even after 10+ years of collecting and tasting I still hardly know ANYTHING. Oh well. I guess part of the fun is learning and experiencing stuff along the way. Knowing that makes all your advice that much more priceless. Thanks again for sharing your years of experience and knowledge with this newbie. I will continue to strive for perfection in designing and building that pond that is right for me...


p.s. After the first pond, I know I will want more...hahaha.

[B.Scott]

Start shapening that shovel Akai and do us proud.

Thanks for the complement JR. What can I say, I have an excellent Sensai

[Vogata]

The point I was trying to get across was not that we are willing to put our name on where Nishikigoi come from, and no we don’t even have a proper back garden outlet. In fact we are struggling hard to get others her to se the line you in fact pointed out.



We are just trying to point out that we feel that more credit should fall on the breeders also on lower levels of Nishikigoi quality. We currently only buy form one source in Europe. Just to bypass advertising it’s a small German with the biggest hart you will ever find. He is the best ambassador for Nishikigoi we have ever had the opportunity to drink coffee with. Every slot we have free we evaluate if he can bee in the slot one-way or the other.



We would just love if there could bee an established culture that gave no doubt off who the breeder is. This would also give the Kichi a real opportunity to choose from places witch philosophy they shared. This would also give a normal meaning to health control and breeding conditions.

This is at present only in place for the really high end some places. We feel that for our Japanese friends and the other serious and striving out there this could only bee a bonus. Trace ability and accountability would also make god husbandry and health control to a thing for more hobbyists. We had our luck and found our mentor, but it was a long and hard road.



It was unbelievably nice to say Nogami and be shown one from him with no doubt. This is the way it should bee everywhere. Even if it was not one in a million we feel that he should take full credit for it. Our thought is more like make us (the consumer aware off where and whom). We think most off us know that you don’t get a RR for the price off a WW any way. With this level off awareness off origins we hope that the serious breeder and the concerned outlet will prosper and keep on delivering the best we can “afford”.

Knowledge off origin also gives security and tranquillity when it comes to many off the qurent health issues currently crowding many keepers’ minds now.