Growout tosai

[vipldy]

Beautiful fish and your growth is great..I also would like to know how often you feed them and how much.


Marie

[aquitori]

Originally Posted by Ryan S.

Told Joe (keokoi) I would post these here a while back. These are part of the "koiphen" growout challenge, Momotaro from Genki Koi here in the US. Born 8/2004 and supplied mostly at 6-9" back in March or April of this year at $150 for a blind selection. In my pond, which is not ideally designed, overstocked/crowded, not enough water changes (Chlormine source that has phosphate levels) I have been doing around 7-8% water changes weekly, and feeding mostly affordable foods (Hai Feng, Azoo, Zeigler, and several others) that I can generally buy for less than $2 per pound. First Koi 7.25" to 17", second one 6.25" to 15.5". Growth has certainly been hurt by ususually high temps this summer, mostly 85-93deg since June, as this fish were like weeds in late april and early june. Starting to get some cooler temps this weeks (cooler as in air temps in the 80s).

Any thoughts on these fish? Beni certainly not finished, but it should be at this point in time, as these are still 13 month olds and developing as I hoped they would.

Have you tried experimenting with none animal high protein food like Hi-Silk straight? You got good growth with low protein food, just wanted to see what kind of growth rate you would get with something of the higher...

[Ryan S.]

Feeding:

I'm using the Koi Kichi Buffet on demand feeder. It took me about 6-7 weeks to get them trained on this, mostly my fault I guess. I keep feeding some by hand which I don't beleive you should do, during this training period this probably hurt my growth a lot, this was peak time for growth. Went on vacation in June and when I came back they figured it out. Any new users should just coat lure in veggy oil and leave them alone, no additional feeding, and they should figure it out in a couple days. In June my fish were eating based on my calculations ~8% of body weight per day. There were several 18-23" 2-3yr olds in pond then which probably skewed those numbers, I'm betting the tosai were eating at least 12%+ percent of body weight per day. With water temps over 85deg, which is basically the weather we have been having from late june untill yesterday here food comsuptions has been much less, the group closer to .5-1.5% per day, whatever they feel like eating. This is roughly the same amount of food for my small group (~1 lb per day). Here May-June and Sept-Oct water temps are usually in the 70s and growth is great, its just been a really hot Sept so far.

Many pond filtration systems may not be up to the task of handling the additional waste of higher feeding, so this feeder may not be a good idea for many folks. Also if you have a number of large fish this may be to much crowding in one area (you could move some water with a jet or air stone to help spread out food more if this is the case).

Food type:

My philosophy starting out was to feed mosty a low protein wheat germ based product. Most of growth was spring when I was feeding Hai Feng Quick-grow (a basic 32% wheat germ based product) and Azoo Growth (35%). Azoo Growth just b/c its so cheap. It probably would have been better to push some with higher protein food looking back. I've used a lot of Zeigler 43% feed, in small pellet so the smaller fish would be more likely to get it (starting in July), I consider this a decent very cheap food for tosai (corn is 3rd ingredient) or as a mix in. Also starting in late August I used Yamakoshi (Sarge's food) 38% G/C formulation, not really so much of a color food, the G/C and Fall versions of the food are closer to the formulations I look for.

This is what I have gone through so far this year from my memory:
~25 lbs of Hai Feng Quickgrow (32%)
~30 lbs of Azoo Growth (35%)
~25 lbs of Zeigler Growth (43%)
~7 lbs of Yamakoshi G/C (38%)
2 lb sample of Yamakoshi Prem (40%)
2 lb sample of ShoKoi (38%)
< 1 lb some other small samples
2 lb Silk Worm Pupae
2 lb imitation crab meat
~3-4 lb shell on shrimp
1 lb collards

Currently feeding roughly an equal mix of Hai Feng WG, Zeigler G, and Yamakoshi G/C, with some collards and shrimp.

[Ryan S.]

Originally Posted by aquitori

Have you tried experimenting with none animal high protein food like Hi-Silk straight? You got good growth with low protein food, just wanted to see what kind of growth rate you would get with something of the higher...

Here I notice great growth in spring and fall, rougly we have a 4 months May/June and Sept/Oct were conditions are great, 70s water temps and fish are at there peak. We should be getting back in to that sweet spot here this week. I have tried Silk Worm Papae as a mix in but its hard to keep fresh. Its hard to justify the cost of hi-silk compaired to something like a mix of pellet food and something like silk worm papae or shrimp. I can usually get frozen shrimp at food lion for $3-4 per lb. I hear its a great food though.

[dcny]

Hi Ryan. Thanks for the pix. Great growth rate on your tosai.

I wish Chirs (woodyacht) didn't lose his Momo to a heron. He's getting very similar growth on his other tosai. It would have been nice to see them next to each other, especially since he's been feeding Hi-Silk and Saki Hikari.

-Dan

[Ryan S.]

Yes, several others with good growth also, probably more that haven't even posted yet. Maybe some of the others that were quick to blame the dealer will be able to see where they went wrong and improve, which is the point of the contest I believe. I've had very good luck with koi from Kevin Pham so far, another Sakuma showa that will be a winner and Gin Rin Shiro Utsuri all doing very well, I've had a few from other importers that just never seemed to grow much. in a little cooler climates may actually be at an advantage over 6 months, others in the middle still need that nice fall weather. Then I'm sure some will be heated or those FL and CA ponders will really blow everyone away overwinter. I would not be suprised with a 20-25" winner. Mine have another month of feed and probably another 1" in them before it ends next spring.

[aquitori]

Originally Posted by Ryan S.

Here I notice great growth in spring and fall, rougly we have a 4 months May/June and Sept/Oct were conditions are great, 70s water temps and fish are at there peak. We should be getting back in to that sweet spot here this week. I have tried Silk Worm Papae as a mix in but its hard to keep fresh. Its hard to justify the cost of hi-silk compaired to something like a mix of pellet food and something like silk worm papae or shrimp. I can usually get frozen shrimp at food lion for $3-4 per lb. I hear its a great food though.

You want to get cheaper just by Sweet potatos, even cheaper.....

[Ryan S.]

Originally Posted by aquitori

You want to get cheaper just by Sweet potatos, even cheaper.....

As year around or just during a specific season. I searched around and never found out much. I thought it was a cool water food. Brought home a huge box of them but they rotted. Not much time, 2 daughters under 2. I can only cook steaks on grill, or microwave popcorn, no joke. Can you microwave the sweet potato.

[dcny]

You can also try imitation crab (white fish). They can generally be had for $2/lb.