Hi Don, I'm pretty reluctant to point a finger at Momotaro simply because I gave them such on hard time on the FIR nonsense . And further, because anyone could have been unlucky enough to have gotten a dose of KHV once the food supply fish started coming from China and let to linger in the natural water supply/ Rivers.
So without adding to anyone’s hardships and hoping to add some information and perspective to the conversation—
Niigata is the birthplace of nishikigoi. Other regions grew out koi and eventually bred tateshita for export, but it was Niigata that held the ‘holy grail’ of genetics.
After world war two, large amounts of koi were brought from the North to the South for both export and grow out. The war had wiped out the lowland breeders in the Hiroshima area and the North escaped damage. The north then resupplied the demand for koi once again in the south.
It was the immigrants of Hiroshima and that lingering connection to the home land that brought koi to Hawaii and later Southern California. Most of this was around the landscaping business and not from high end collector demand. And since knowledge base was low outside Japan, these tateshita from Southern Japan served the demand well.
As time passed and demand for ‘good koi like in the TFH picture books’ increased, the Northern clans began exporting in earnest- directly. With ZNA amateurs leading the way as Japanese koi judges, the road was paved for breeders and Japanese carpet baggers to follow.
Meanwhile, back in Japan, a curious thing began happening, the Southern ‘customer breeders’ of the great Northern Breeders were becoming serious breeders in their own right. They not only had now gathered a good gene pool, they had years of skill established and something the North did not have- a very long growing season. Konishi, Sakai SFF, Tanaka, Omosako were all moving from grow out status/local breeders, to world class producers.
Moving ahead to more modern times, the Sakai SFF became renowned for it’s high class tategoi auction. More recently, Momotaro has become known for the same kind of tategoi auction.
So Ironically, today, many of the Northern breeders come down to buy stock for their own lines. The direction of sales ( north to south) has indeed reversed! South to North! This is due to the numbers game and the weather as much as the skill of the southern breeders. So today many of the North’s blood lines flourish in the south and in some case, superior to the north’s.
Here in lies a problem however. Northern breeders buying southern stock ‘may have’ invited KHV into their farms? This is not a blame game, only one explanation as to how the disease ‘can’ travel around Japan during the regular course of business.
Hope this sheds some light without disrupting anyone's apple cart!
JR
09-18-2006
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