[Worldwide Koi Club] Koi not eating and hiding
Hi Lorraine (and Dennis). I’d like to chime in on this thread because I’m very concerned about the rock/boulder problem that you are highlighting here. We also have rocks and boulders in our pond, but they’re a necessity for us. You see, we’re just a few houses up from a large lake and our water table in the area is always very high. Without the rocks and boulders our liner lifts and bubbles from underneath, and the weight of the boulders is necessary to keep it in place.
I didn’t foresee this problem when we first created our pond. In fact, 2005 was a very dry summer and we had no indication that this would be a problem when we first dug the hole. It was only with the onset of the autumn rains that the bubbling began to appear, and by the following spring there was no doubt that the rocks were absolutely necessary.
Do you (or does anyone else) have any suggestions for me so that I might prevent the types of losses that Dennis is describing here? This is year four for our pond and (touch wood) we’ve been fortunate so far. I do a pretty thorough spring and fall clean up, but of course there’s no way I can get all the malm from the bottom of the pond, even with the new pond vacuum I bought this year. Any suggestions would be welcome.
Sincerely, Brenda
On 6-Jul-08, at 5:28 PM, Lorraine wrote:
> —– Original Message —– > From: Dennis > To: worldwidekoiclub@yahoogroups.com > Sent: Saturday, July 05, 2008 2:11 AM > Subject: Re: Fw: [Worldwide Koi Club] Koi not eating and hiding > > > — In worldwidekoiclub@yahoogroups.com, “Lorraine” > wrote: >> >> Hi Dennis. First of all, I would make a one third water change > from the bottom of the pond and stop all feeding of your fish. Let > me ask you a few questions. >> >> How many fish were in this pond? > > 30 fish > >> What was their approximate size? > > Smallest 3 1/2″ largest 5″ > >> Do you make water changes? > > Usually weekly about 20% > > > Very good. I wish people would do water changes more often. How > many gallons is your pond? > > >> If so, how much and how often? >> What is the size of your filtering system? > > 12″ X 30″ X 12″ thick > > If my calculations are correct, your filter is about 15 gallons. > >> How often do you clean it? > > The filters daily, The pond roughly once per month > > The filters you clean daily are probably mechanical. When you clean > the biological filter, how do you clean it? > > > >> Is it an upflow filter? > > No down flow > > Does the water go into the top of the filter, down through the > filtering medium and up a pipe on the inside of the filter leading to > the top of the filter and out to a waterfall if you have one? If your > filtering system is working properly, your filtering medium should be > clean. The minute it turns green and sludgy, it means your filter > isn’t working properly. > > >> Is there gravel at the bottom of your pond? > > River rock and bolders > > That can be a real problem because debris gets trapped in the rocks > and starts to pollute the pond. > > >> I suspect that if there is and you’ve never lost any fish before, > that the pond was put in within the last two or three years. > > An ocassional fish loss never more than 1 a month and usualy it is > vanished fish before now. This pond was put up in March of this year. > > There is a possibility that if you have just added a new fish, it > could have brought in a parasite or maybe a bacterial infection. > Losing a fish once a month isn’t really a good sign. I wonder if you > might be having trouble with your bio-filter like, maybe your cleaning > it too much. If it’s working properly it should stay nice and clean. > What are you using for filtering medium (bio-media)? > >> >> When fish are not well they tend to either be at the surface of the > pond gasping for air or huddled at the bottom of the pond also > gasping. > > It seems like I’n the last 3 days I’ll have two or three I’ll find > on the surface then within a few hours those are dead. All the other > fish are acting normally. The next day or to so I’ll have a feww > more different ones acting like that. > > > Normally, ponds that have gravel or rock in them do well for about > two years and then everything starts to go wrong. The pond and filter > starts to smell and fish die quite rapidly. When this happens, I > suggest that the rocks be removed to keep the pond clean. The fact > that the pond is relatively new, the debris under the rocks shouldn’t > be bad. > > Hope to hear from you soon. > Yours Koily, Lorraine > >> It is possible that you have some type of predator attack but > seeing as you aren’t seeing any bodies lying around this may not be > the problem. Herons tend to gulp the fish right back but raccoons > tend to remove the fish from the pond and play with them for a while > before they start feeding. They don’t usually eat all of the fish. >> >> Hope to hear from you soon. >> Yours Koily, Lorraine >> >> >> —– Original Message —– >> From: Dennis >> To: worldwidekoiclub@yahoogroups.com >> Sent: Thursday, July 03, 2008 8:55 AM >> Subject: Re: Fw: [Worldwide Koi Club] Koi not eating and hiding >> >> >> This is interesting… Yesterday I lost three Koi. Two had bright > red >> gills and one was more fless colored than the other two. One of > the >> bright red ones did show a black scab in its belly reagon. The > other >> two did not have any signes. I added 8 lbs of salt to my 1,800 > gallon >> pond last night. >> >> This mormning I fond two more dead koi. The gills were the > slightly >> lighter color that then normal. I measured nitrates, nitrites and >> amonia everything showed 0 to 0.5 ppm reading. >> >> I also ran a few other checks yesterday. Alkilinity was extremly > high >> compared to the past. My test kit for alkilinity goes to 3.6 >> milligrams per liter and it showed at the max. My pH always > fluctuates >> after a rain it can drop to under 7.0pH but normal tap water for > me >> 8.3, my reading was 8.4pH. >> >> My thughts are to add an additional 8 lbs of salt today but I’m > still >> baffled. The lawn service was here 3 days ago so I also checked >> phosphates and agian I got a zeoro reading. >> >> Other cymthums are that the fish seem just a little lazey and > have >> decreased apetite but are still eating. My water hycants are > turning a >> more yellow color that normal. However my water lillies started >> blooming again. The withe koi are not showing any red or pinkness > in >> there finns which is suposed to be a stress indicator. We did > have >> thunder storms the last few days as well. >> >> Any clues or ideas? If I do not get any new ideas my next move > would >> be to drop that pH and alkilinity with slow additions of muratic > acid, >> as well as the addition of the 8 more pounds of salt. >> >> — In worldwidekoiclub@yahoogroups.com, “KeepKoi” > wrote: >> >>> >>> If you find the gills are a very light pink or whitish color, > you >> could have high levels of ammonia in the water, …. but usually > with >> high levels of ammonia, there are other visual indicators on the > koi >> that indicate they are in trouble. The white color indicated > there is >> not enough blood circulation to the gills, so again, the koi > can’t >> breath properly. High ammonia levels can literally burn the > protective >> slime covering off of the koi, and will also burn the fins and > gills of >> the koi on its way to eventually killing them. >>> >> >> >> >> >> >> [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] >> > > > > > > [Non-text portions of this message have been removed] > > > ———————————— > > Yahoo! Groups Links > > >
Category: Philippines Internet Koi Society
