Do you have a favorite koi

[MikeM]

Keep the fresh water flowing and I'll hope you reach more than 85cm.

I'm guessing the Sanke spent her third season in a mud pond? It is speculation on my part, but I think young fish forget their fear of predators when moved to the "safe" environment of a hobbyist's pond, while those with more experience in the "wild" have learned that enemies come from above. I expect she would consume a full share of sinking food, but is leery of the dangers of coming to the surface for floating pellets.

[JasonS]

Mike, some fish are just like that. Although I hadn't connected it with 'male' behavior, I think it does match my own fish. The males do tend to 'hit and run' more.

An auto-feeder worked well for me last year. Maybe that's an option?

[hwong]

Mike, The Sanke is a full time city lass in a concrete pond. Mud ponds are a very risky venture unless they are tried and tested and in tropical countries like ours, we have plenty of predators. The worst are monitor lizards and otters. Even without these, parisites are aplenty.

My kois became frigidty right after I reduced my numbers to 12 pcs from 27 one and a half years ago. They have been like this ever since. The Sanke has improved quite abit in eating manners at Dtbh.

Rgds

[Tom C]

Jason what atuo feeder do you use? I have been looking at a lot of them, and I do like the one Hikari makes, but is not cheap.

Tom

[JasonS]

Tom, I got one of those 5 gallon bucket feeders from William Lim. Original manufacturer was... I forget; an aquaculture designed thing. Was a bit dusty -- he may still have one or two in the warehouse.

Just hook it up to a digitial timer from the hardware store and let it go.

I never put alot of food in it because I didn't feed very much. Maybe a week's worth at a time. But it sure makes it easy to feed the fish while I'm at work.

[Dan Blatt]

Here's one "Hawaiian Mike" uses. Works pretty well...they feed themselves. Sorry for the small picture. Hey Mike...gotta larger photo and opinion on it?

[dtbh]

Quote: Originally Posted by JasonS Mike, some fish are just like that. Although I hadn't connected it with 'male' behavior, I think it does match my own fish. The males do tend to 'hit and run' more. An auto-feeder worked well for me last year. Maybe that's an option?

I feed my fish every 2 hours and because of this frequent encounters with my kois I note that kois have many different preferred feeding behaviours and I attempt to list them below :

1. Chagoi style....eat irrespective of what is going on
2. Location-dependent eaters....only eat at certain locations on the surface
3. Mid-water eaters....prefer pellets to be "pushed" into midwater by water return.
4. Bottom feeders.
5. Eat and run.....usually but not exclusively males and they are very irritating as they disturb the others. You can appreciate why kois with this eating habit tend to "leave" my pond very fast.

I personally prefer kois with habit 1. and 3. as they tend to be growers and very pleasing to observe as they feed.

I do not use an autofeeder but I get my maid to feed whenever I am not around (she usually feed 3 out of the 8-9x/day). Some hobbyists term this "remote voice control". Better than autofeeder?

[MikeM]

The eat and run types in my pond are only the younger fish. By the third season, even the males are slow and patient. One 6 year male (my daughter's favorite) ignores the floating pellets when first tossed onto the surface. After some others have had a few mouths full, the current in the pond will push a few rafts of pellets across the surface. He then positions himself with his head and dorsal fin above water and lets the current wash the pellets into his mouth. A very lazy fellow.

[donald]

Dr. Teh, your posting is very interesting .... with 2 hrs intervals, could you also post your (summer?) typical water temperature, feeding times and the % daily total feeding weight?

Isn't it nice to have a maid help in koi keeping, something that is totally new to me! Yes I too would like very much to have maid help, particularly the cute ones. Donald

[dtbh]

Quote: Originally Posted by MikeM The eat and run types in my pond are only the younger fish. By the third season, even the males are slow and patient. One 6 year male (my daughter's favorite) ignores the floating pellets when first tossed onto the surface. After some others have had a few mouths full, the current in the pond will push a few rafts of pellets across the surface. He then positions himself with his head and dorsal fin above water and lets the current wash the pellets into his mouth. A very lazy fellow.

Very true. The younger fish initially tend to be eat-and-runners but if you observe them carefully over time you will notice they will gradually have their preferred feeding habits. I sometimes use their eating habits to sex them but obviously this can be flawed.

Having said that I must add that the eating habits I have mentioned are not sex-dependent. I have seen males eating like a chagoi and as expected they were growers.