growing huge kois in a flash??????

[PapaBear]

An excellent thread on the subject of clay came up a few weeks back. It would be well worth your time to give it a look see.
http://koi-bito.com/forum/showthread.php?t=3437&page=1

[aquitori]

Kamusta Jay, welcome to this Koi Board first off...Honestly there is no better way to grow koi than to have a big pond, very good water and good genetics...

[B.Scott]

Quote: Originally Posted by Louie Jay, My pond is made of gunite with plastic cement to seal and give a smooth finish. The alkaline in cement leaches and mixes with the pond water keeping the pond water on the alkaline side of the chart. koi prefere this water hardness...

Don't know about you Louie but if I am not mistaken the prevailing school of thought tends to lean toward a pond with softer water and a pH just over 7. Many of the high end koi keeper spend oodles of money installing Reverse Osmosis systems to lower the "Total Desolved Solids ( TDS ) together with the KH, pH and GH in order to improve growth and the contition of skin.

Here you see a typical setup.

http://koi-uk.co.uk/Using_reverse_osmosis.htm

I would never recomend adding a couple of cinder blocks to the pond if for no other reason that an expensive koi could injure itself.


B.Scott

[maryland_ponder]

Tile/clay bricks wont leach the types of clay they are speaking of. You will need to add the clay in a powder form.

As for the cement pond, cements leach a very hi amount of harmful things when new. You would have to age the cement prior to adding fish or coat it with a resin type paint to insulate it from the water.

Quote: Originally Posted by killroy thanks louie....new info for me. I always right new info in my small koi ntbk. My very small pond right now is made out of cement. Would it make any difference if my pond was made out of clay bricks or tiles? if yes, im planning to put clay tiles on my pond as my flooring and siding. I know this is far from the real mud pond.....aesthetically, my pond would look better and i hope there is a small contribution to water quality though jay

[mike]

Quote: Originally Posted by aquitori Kamusta Jay, welcome to this Koi Board first off...Honestly there is no better way to grow koi than to have a big pond, very good water and good genetics...

and lots of (good quality) food while maintaining good water
and good water also includes good aeration

[aquitori]

Quote: Originally Posted by aragorn and lots of (good quality) food while maintaining good water and good water also includes good aeration

True. Also labor and material is cheap to build a big pond....did someone say 1500ton pond for less than $15K?

[killroy]

Wowa!!!!!!! Im tryn to really relate and catch up with u guys...I've realized this forum is indeed for the pro's (but will always try to sneak in with the group..hehehehe) A simple word(clay) means a thousand principles for you guys.This forum is way beyond the forum I know. WOW!

Thanks louie for the insights again...will take in consideration everythn you said but I have to say, som1 has a different point of view of somtehing. Thats why this hobby is really complicated yet challenging. I guess I just have to stay with whats going to work for me and my koi's. Sadly, My pond is very small...very. No kois as of the moment since they all died recently but im learning. My pond is made out of cement, and I have to agree I should have aged it a bit...Now, my pond has lots of algea on its sides and bottom, i dont have any problem with green water not like before that I use UV for it.

A bigger pond would be really great, hope inthe next 5 years I could have one.

thanks
jay

PS...aquitori, I see you know some tagalog words....

[B.Scott]

Quote: Originally Posted by killroy No kois as of the moment since they all died recently but im learning. ....

Lukes Motto used to be:

"Exprience is what remains once you've killed all your fish"

It's quite an astute observation if you ask me!

[Louie]

I would never recomend adding a couple of cinder blocks to the pond if for no other reason that an expensive koi could injure itself.
If you will review my post I do not recommend cinder blocks in the pond. I said system, filter, waterway ,settleing tank or waterfall. Sorry I did not make myselve clear. I live in California and most of the ponds have a ph range 7.5 to 8.2 depending on location. It would be interesting to know what the range of ph is around the country. I like to enter my fish in shows and pride my selve in buying fish in the 10"-15" range and growing them for show. My ph is 8.1 in my current pond.
Pick 10 fish all of the same class in a tub if your dealer has good quality you will notice that the white background on some will look painted and shine. My point is that if you start with a koi that has luster and you can grow it to a desent size and keep the luster you have a good system.
Note : there are many other things to look for when purchasing koi Shiroji[white background] was only one example
Louie

B.Scott[/quote]

[B.Scott]

Sorry Louie. I must have mis-read it. Anaheim? I went to school there... Western High (class of '73)! I used to live in Cypress just behind the race track. Small world eh?

Our water here in Holland tends to be about the same as yours, at least here in the west of the country that is.WE have the added advantage of not having chlorine in the water either. I do know of places in the center of the country that have water with a pH of around 7 and a KH of just over 2! I wish I could say the same!
At the moment I'm looking into going down the RO path as well. Just a small unit that would trickle a constant flow of RO water into the filter, perhaps into an overflow buffer vat so I would have some soft water to top up with after I flush the filters.

B.Scott