What is your "Fall" treatment ?

[aquitori]

Since I live in Cali, I have treated my pond with a 48hr Quick Cure treatment to make sure I have no problems goin into spring. I am also feeding once a day to fast the fish a bit..

[D@z]

Ooops, double post

[D@z]

Quote: Originally Posted by aquitori Since I live in Cali, I have treated my pond with a 48hr Quick Cure treatment to make sure I have no problems goin into spring. I am also feeding once a day to fast the fish a bit..

Why treat when you have nothing wrong? Medications are not good for fish or ponds, you should use them is little as is necessary, sorry for my negativity but in all my years keeping koi I've never done anything like this and never had a problem in spring. I live in the UK so maybe you guys do things differently?

As for feeding, I feed them as much as they will eat quickly, just as I do all year round. They will not eat it if it's not right, usually they eat, to some extent, right down to 5 or 6 degrees. Never had a problem.

[MikeM]

D@Z, I agree with you that treatment without cause is not preferred. But, there are many who do a Fall treatment and stay silent about it because they do not want to be ridiculed by other kichi. The idea is to rid the fish/pond of as many of the vermin always present as possible, so when the fish weaken over their winter rest in low temps there will be fewer baddies to take advantage. I doubt that reasoning, since the parasites in our ponds are able to reproduce so rapidly in appropriate conditions that within a couple of days the original population can be restored. Arguably, the new population is more resistant to the particular treatment chemicals that it was originally. However, if truth be told, there are many who do it and since they have fewer problems come Spring, the one is thought to be a cause for the other. I tend to think it is simply that the koikeeper who is so attentive, maintaining good conditions without regard to weather or season, has good results; and would not need to treat to get like results. At the same time, I understand the notion: This is what I do and I'm not going to change what works for me because of some assertive eggheads on the internet.

[TategoiKohaku]

I agree with Mike. I really don't like to do treatment unless there is a problem. I just killed one of my best Maruyama kohaku by overdosing Superverm. This kohaku I just bought recently for the Orlando Young Koi show. The fish looked healthy in my QT. However, I treated Superverm just for prevention. I read the instruction on doses 1ml for 100gal. My QT is about 800gal and I filled half of water which equates to 400gal. So I should use 4ml or 4cc to treat. I got my syringe with mark as CC and OZ. There is 60CC and 2 OZ volume for the syringe. By mistaken, I thought this is a 2CC syringe, and I used the 2 full syringes of SuperVerm on my QT. I actually did 100times the doses . When I found out, it was too late. My fish was gone.
KN

[dick benbow]

I like to have my koi in the inside pond by mid october. I match the temp inside and out and bring them over. I'll keep them at the same temp for several weeks till around the first of November and then start dropping toward 55F. I keep my eyes open and see if anyone is flashing and treat only when I see the signs.

I'll feed wheatgerm and cooked barley thru the winter. I salt the barley with garlic salt which enhances the flavor. It's good roughage and was recommended to me by Toshio sakai.

I continue my 24/7 addition of water and daily draining of the vortexes. I'll cut back my air stones by about half because the water at lower temps is easily saturated.

Ill keep with this regiment until march when i slowly start rising the temps again. I try to feed enough during the winter to meet their metabolism needs
and nothing more. I don't wish them to gain or loose weight but wish to have the females absorb their eggs' nutrition. the longer i'm at this the more I favor
sinking wheatgerm during this time.....

[KJo]

Dick,

I have some questions since I'm moving the koi into the garage this year (2,000 gallons with a 4,000 gallon bead filter + prefilter). So you keep the temperature at 55 degrees? Any problems with bacterial infections at this temp? I'm planning on using Koizyme, but thought that maybe I should boost the minimum temp to 62 degrees to avoid aeromonas alley.
Kris

[carolyn swanson]

As soon as the fish from Japan are quarantined and have adjusted, I worm the whole bunch. At this time of the year, probably no new fish, and thus parasites, will be introduced into the pond for at least six months or so.

[dick benbow]

Kris Welcome!
55F may seem like a problem but it is not. If your koi come in clean and you keep good water, you have nothing to worry about. The addition of the product you mentioned would not hurt and might give you the confidence to run at this temp. What is trying to be accomplished here is to guard the health of your females over the age of 3 with egg production.
If you have any follow up questions pls ask.

[KJo]

Thanks for your response, Dick. I guess I shouldn't have mentioned a product name here and I really apologize! Water quality shouldn't be a problem especially with the reduced feeding 55 degrees will allow. The koi haven't experienced any problems in 2 years now, although I will be adding a couple of quarantined babies to the herd that I acquired in July. I'll give it a go at 55. I can easily up the temperature if I encounter problems.

Kris