Spreading Red

[mrbradleybradley]

JR eliquently describes the spreading white gene, yet I rarely see discussion on red that rises on asagi or more interestingly on koi that would otherwise fit the spreading white gene description - ie shiro mujis that turn into kohakus and shiro bekkos that turn into sankes. Although, the red on these koi never seems to finish to a show level. Such koi I have had appear amongst goshiki spawns with regularity.

I imagine, such koi would normally make it to the culling net and therefore, little is said about them.

BB

[PapaBear]

I'm glad you brought this up. We have a smallish male bekko that has done a strange metamorphosis over the past two years that sort of fits your scenario.
He was 6" long when we got him as a modest shiro bekko. No signs of yellow except on his nose, which was nothing more than the juvenile male look. He remained shiro for another year and his face cleared up.
Last year he began to go yellow on the left side of his body, which I took as a sign of poor quality shiro, but as the season progressed the entire lefts side became a rather normal looking Ki bekko, while the right half of his body remained shiro, without any sign of yellowing. The dorsal fin divided the shiro from the ki straight down the middle from head to tail... He looked so odd we kept him just for grins.
Coming out of winter he looked the same this year, but the yellow began to spill over the dorsal line onto the right side and by July he was entirely Ki bekko and darkening somewhat. He is now a dull Orenji color Ki bekko, and if any stranger was to look at him today they would never know he had ever been shiro.
God only knows what he'll look like this time next year.

[PapaBear]

Ooops...........

[MikeM]

I think Bradley is describing 'secondary' Hi? ...I'm playing with a Shiro Utsuri this year that as tosai had a faint blush of red near the peduncle. I was anticipating it would fade with growth. It is not. Instead, it has expanded some and a blush of Hi along one jaw is threatening. The breeders seem to know what to expect. She would be a fairly nice little utsuri without the secondary Hi. When I catch her for annual measurement in a month or two, I'll decide whether to keep her another year or let someone have a very nice pond fish.

[mrbradleybradley]

Hi MikeM

I believe this is different to secondary hi.

If you did not know the background of the koi, you would think it was a kohaku or sanke outright. The beni is uniform from head to tail, although it has less depth.

BB

[JasPR]

I agree with Mike. It is all secondary hi. This hi is located in the most active layer of skin - the epidermis. If you look at asagi with bright beni you will see it is in the head, fins and lateral line and belly areas. The skin is thinner here and epidermis is predominate. The red moves up the body with age. This is not to be confused with asagi that go aka matsuba like ( non metallic). That is a different base gentics at work.
In the case of Kanoko, we see it appear, disappear and sometimes even re-appear before going shiro.
The level of accomplishment in beni today is very high. We have kohaku that produce a density of color cells in all levels of the skin. Secondly the skin is of a type that is thick but translucent with reflecting cells and colorless cells. And thirdly, these selectively bred fish have an ability to produce bright orange red color or yellow orange color from a normal balanced diet without great emphasis on color enhanced food types.
I say this to put into perspective the individual or isolated genetic pool that can produce beni or orangie color later in life. It's an interesting phenomena, no doubt. Just not the trend.
Bradley, any before and after pictures? That would be interesting to see---

[JasPR]

Speaking of 'change' this is the most remarkable change I've ever seen. I posted it before but for those who have nit seen this-This fish won in BOTH varieties over a short period of time-

[dick benbow]

a picture would definetely help. The sensuke bloodline was notorious for secondary hi. The finest skined kohaku I ever owned came from sensuke and on it's 2nd year developed secondary hi. Crushing........

[dick benbow]

in a past issue of KOI USA, there was an article penned by Joel at Pan intercorp that used with permission a series of photos from a japanese koi magazine where true red developed and spread on a koi. Anyone else remember the issue. I think it was entitled nothing is impossible?

[Auntiesue]

I'm following this thread with great interest as this is a topic I've been wanting to learn about and understand 1) what does secondary Hi look like and 2) is it usually genetically predisposed? Exactly what is it?