[AquaticLife] Help..koi keep dying
Hi Manda,
I see that Steve has already replied and I concur with his reply. Your pond is not large enough to be a “Koi Pond” unless you limit it to only a couple of Koi and even then, you’ll have to do frequent PWC’s (partial water changes).. at least weekly or more often and increase your filtration.
For a mini-pond, you would be better off going with goldfish and there is a goldfish called a Sarassa Comet and many of them have similar markings to Koi but they stay in the 12″ range so you could have five or six of them (and possibly as many as ten) without too many problems as long as you keep up with your weekly PWC’s and filter cleaning/maintenance.
Keeping a pond successfully (knowing how the ecology/biology/chemistry all works together) is kind of like riding a bike. When you are first starting out, you’re going to have incidents and then one day it’s all going to click and it will all be so easy then. The biggest thing that ALL fishkeepers need to know and fully understand is “The Nitrogen Cycle” (Ammonia>Nitrite>Nitrate). On my blog (link in my sig), I have a page called “A to Z of Fishkeeping” and there are two free online tutorials that will walk you through all of the basics of fishkeeping. The tutorials are mostly geared towards aquariums but the ecology/biology/chemistry is the same… a pond is just a big outdoor aquarium. A pond also has other issues because it is outdoors so you have to deal with leaves, other animals, etc. On the right side of my blog, there are also links to pond specific articles that make good reading as well.
The main thing with keeping fish is to stay away from as many chemicals as possible and fresh clean water (frequent PWC’s) is the best remedy for most problems.
Lenny Vasbinder Fish Blog - http://GoldLenny.blogspot.com (Links to articles referenced above listed on the right side under Archives - Year, Month and under Labels)
Category: Philippines Internet Koi Society
