Okay I am dumbfounded....

I was going to order some kohaku (koi) when I came across the Sarassa comet (goldfish).... :o They look exactly the same... How does one tell the difference?...


Thx,
Adreamer2

Koi and goldfish are different species. Koi grow to 2-4 feet long while a comet may grow to 12-15" at most. The easiest way to tell them apart when they're both young and small is by the two barbels under the mouth of the koi. Goldfish don't have those. I can tell myself by shape of the fish alone (young goldfish almost always have a larger height to length ratio) and the skin/scales but some people can't. A koi will come to the surface and mouth it for food, showing off the barbels. A goldfish may also mouth the surface but their mouths are smaller in relation to their bodies and don't have the barbels.

Aha!!! Makes sense to me!!!

Thx,
Adreamer2

how big of a pond are you putting them in?

4,000 gal.....



Adreamer2

what fish do you have in it?

Koi....


I had 40 koi ranging from 18" to 3"... 6 goldfish.... 2 frogs... 1 turtle that goes into the pond whenever he so chooses...

Now, I only have 6 koi..... 4 goldfish (in quarantine).... 15 more coming...

I had my pond well established for 2 years.... It had excellent filtration and regular water changes.....


LOSSES:

In the two yrs.... I lost 6 small fish.....2 were eaten by cat.....25 feeder fish....

STOLEN:

9 kohaku.......
2 RES....
35 baby koi.....



Adreamer2

i dont get japanese koi because people will steal them. I have 5 domestic koi in my pond. I think 40 is alot of koi for a 4000 gallon. Wait till all those guys get big!

You assume they were stolen but you don't know for sure, right? Are you in a populous area? RES will run away without a fence. Is your pond fenced? Certainly, 40 koi would have overcrowded your size pond when they grew up. I'm sorry you lost most of them but the remaining koi should be healthier for the extra room.

yes koi do get 2 feet so 40 2 feet fish is too much for a pond. thats probably why your fish got sick.

I was well aware of the implication of them growing 3 feet in length... I was looking forward to it...

With koi, or any fish for that matter, you take a chance that any of them would survive....

I knew they would not all make it to see many years or such sizeable lengths...

All koi owners hope that they will live to see ripe ages, but a high percentage of them are likely to die as a high percent are culled in hopes of finding a gem. My point is the gem is hard to find just as all koi do not survive...

I cannot certainly say "for sure"... But, when I stock my fish food on my deck by my pond, and it comes up missing the same day my fish do... well... I suspect others.... Same thing happened with my RES, their food was taken....

Kinda hard to imagine a predator that takes a creature and it's food.... Unless it is human... Huh.. Humans eat anything these days... :D

Also, my yard is fenced.....


Adreamer2

lol

Oops, it does sound like foul play was afoot. Maybe add some electrical component to your fence to zap those naughty people!

lol. good idea.

Wow, I havent posted here in a while! One time I accidently brought a copper colored koi that was mixed in with the feeder goldfish. It was so small so I got it, and put it in my tank with my other goldfish. All the goldfish used to chase it away, but it had a hearty appetite. One day though it suddenly died and I was so sad, but I couldnt believe they mixed it in I mean if I was breeding koi that would have been my lucky day! I wish I knew to feed it koi food instead of goldish food, mabye it would have lived then?

was your tank overstocked? most feeder goldfish arent healthy so it probably got sick.

Koi can live on goldfish food. Are you sure it was a koi? Koi have barbels under their mouth. How big did the koi grow? If he was big, then water quality and/or lack or room may have contributed to his death. If not, then it could have been anything. Often, we never know why a fish dies.

yah, koi are usually not kept in aquariums as they get too large.

It was a 10 gallon tank with 9 small feeder goldfish, and the one koi who was half the size of the goldfish. Yes, it had barbels under it's chin they were very tiny. The koi was about the size of a rosy minnow, so I can see how people mixed it up with a feeder goldfish. Size was no problem, nor food, mabye it just got sick and died quickly due to it's small size and being harrassed, but it never got injured or had it's fins torn.

it probably got sick.