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**Sb2004** · 2023-11-15T22:46:28

Originally posted by Anton_24 View Post

How time flies. I'm bumping this up from 2014, whew. Well it's the end of 2020 almost 2021 and we do indead have a dwarf koi already. It's all platinum white, no large mirror scales and about a third the size of the fish shown here by KK.Menon. A very beutifull auspicious looking fish for the Chinese, the caricature of a wise ancient koi. Four extremely long barbelfs that swirl and ribbon elegantly as it swims. It also has a very showy tail fin, being broad from base and extremely long, held open when active, all the fins are extremely long so when it swims its a flurry of fin. They swim extremtly well and can turn on a dime. Interestingly the head is the same size as a normal koi, just the body is compressed. Good ones conformtion wise are now not hard to find as they are arriving in big batches already in the ornamental fish markert shops in Hong Kong. The top-lines are nice and smooth and the belly low and wide. I have six such fish in my ponds, they are extremely active and feed very well. At maturity about the size of a small football. Extremly nice adults fetch extremely high prices, in the thousands of $US. Juveniles are just a few hundred HK$. I will try and get some pictures at the market, my own are far too fast to take a picture they litraly take of out the water at feeding time. This is a danger as they tend to leap around the surface in excitment. These look nothing like the long bodied butterfly koi

hey,

I’m new to keeping koi and just purchased two young (approximately 2 year old) “short bodied” platinum butterfly koi from a Chinese importer in the USA.

i’m wondering how large yours have gotten since this post? And I was also wondering if you have any idea if their lifespan would be similar to that of a typical koi or would it be somewhat less?

any information on how to feed them, and what to feed them, and breed specific care would be greatly appreciated.

hopefully someone sees this and knows more than I do, there isn’t much to go off of online about them.

Thanks

**Anton_24** · 2023-11-17T07:06:46

Originally posted by Sb2004 View Post

hey,

I’m new to keeping koi and just purchased two young (approximately 2 year old) “short bodied” platinum butterfly koi from a Chinese importer in the USA.

i’m wondering how large yours have gotten since this post? And I was also wondering if you have any idea if their lifespan would be similar to that of a typical koi or would it be somewhat less?

any information on how to feed them, and what to feed them, and breed specific care would be greatly appreciated.

hopefully someone sees this and knows more than I do, there isn’t much to go off of online about them.

Thanks

Hi yes, they seem to live a normal time span for a koi, even with the extreme compressed body of an Oranda goldfish. Mine haven't become very long just rounder broader, the fins have become much longer, a coule of them would do fine in a large Aquarium. Care wise I would say the same as koi feeding wise, they have normal sized mouths. I use Baby JAP Hikari koi pellets as they're a good size for the goldfish in there which are the majority, depends on the age but this would be fine to start with small ones a couple of inches. Water quality is very important, good biological filtration as these have very long fins which can easily become congested and inflamed, this applies to normal Koi too. I don't know how they do in mud ponds but guess they should be fine if Koi are fine ie if there is loads of space and oxygen etc. Water temps the same. I'm trying to contact the breeder in Taiwan for exporting to America at the moment for someone in America who contacted me. They are freely available here. Generaly called "short body koi" rather than dwarf or anything else. Video of some https://fb.watch/omNKuDY3kO/