If you just noticed that your pond now has a million small kois that are swimming around, then go to the feeding section, but if you don’t breed koi and you need an introduction, then read on.
Spawning usually occurs in the early summer months and is very dependent on water temperature — 68 degrees F is minimal for spawning. Your adult must be sexually mature to participate in successful mating, and this usually occurs at the age of 2 years for males and at the age of 3 years for females. Keep in mind when you choose parents, the more women, the more eggs it can produce. Usually spawning activities and related behaviors will take place in the early morning and can last only 30 minutes. The whole process is a bit rough, since the male needs to physically stimulate the hatching of eggs, pushing the female's belly. After the eggs are released, the male fertilizes them, releasing the sperm.
Breeding material
If you plan to have a specialized breeding ground, you will certainly want breeding material. It is just a material that offers surface area for eggs. This may be in the form of aquatic plants, ridges, “spawning brush” or “spawning mop”. Most importantly, it should be something that will not be toxic in any way and has a large surface area for attaching eggs. You will want to have a lot of breeding material for attaching eggs, perhaps about 50-60 percent of the bottom of the spawning tank should be covered. The size of your breeding ground will depend on how much fish you plan to try to reproduce. It should be something from 1 to 2 feet in size and maybe 6 feet by 6 feet - some fans have used inflatable pools for children with success.
After the eggs have been laid and the adults have been removed from the spawning tank, you should see the hatching after about 4 days. When you are satisfied with the density of the hatched fish, you can remove the breeding material.
Tank / pond conditions
You can not walk with a separate tank or pond, but simply skip it in the main pond. If so, keep in mind that if you have a goldfish among your adult koi, you will have some loss of eggs due to the appetite for the golden fish for koi eggs.
Your koi eggs will hatch 4 days after fertilization. They then join the structure, similar to the side of a tank or pond, for 2-3 days, where they will feed their yolk sac. If you see a lot of koi swimming, as well as a lot of eggs at the bottom, feel free to remove them, as they most likely cannot fertilize and will only raise ammonia levels. Be sure to monitor all water chemistry, especially ammonia and pH.
What to feed koi?
At about the 10th day (rather, depending on the water temperature), you will notice that your coi-fry is trying to test its new ability to swim, and at this time feeding will begin. Many koi enthusiasts will start with something called an “infusoria”, which is nothing more than a classification by size. As a rule, it is defined as very small aquatic organisms, and for a fry should be live daphnids (water fleas) and / or brine shrimps (“sea midge”). If you can't get the ciliates, you can try the chicken eggs. Boil the eggs (some just use the yolks), and in a blender, mix about 30 ounces of water from a tank or pond. Simply pour this mixture onto the surface of your breeding tank or pond. You will be fed about 4 times a day. In general, you are trying to match the size of food with a cot, so this is the right size for them. After about a week from this mixture, you can switch to a powder called “frying powder”, which can be sprinkled over the surface of the water.
You can also use standard koi protein capsules and basically grind them into fine powder and choose for a specific grain size, shaking it through a sieve. It may take several days for the fry to tie up the new powder with food and to get a taste for it. Be sure to clean the bottom of the tank of any waste and excess / uncleaned products - you really want to avoid the formation of ammonia. Make sure that you provide sufficient aeration for your koi, and this is especially true in summer when warmer water temperatures mean less oxygen carrying capacity.
Some of the other foods you can feed are frozen brine shrimps, growing live brine pancakes in your holding tank or main pond and freeze-dried krill. You can also add spirulina powder and wheat germ as a dietary supplement.
Culling
One mistake that people make is trying to keep all koi, what a bad idea. You definitely want to “dilute the herd” because by doing this you create a healthier environment for the remaining koi. Your first round of culling should take place about 1 inch or 25 mm. This should fall about 4 weeks (possibly longer) after the first swim. Another culling should occur one month after the first or so, when they are about 2.5 inches or 6.25 cm. The first and second culling should remove about 80% of the initial population. In addition, the third selection must begin one month after the second and remove from 50 to 60% of what is left. When culling, you should look for warping, undesirable color, unstable swimming, sluggish swimmers and, as a rule, undesirable practices. You do not need to euthanize this fish - give some to your friends!
