Selections. And a general update

The last couple of weeks has been rather hectic; finding time for selections has been difficult. I put another hour or two into it this evening, and I can see the beginning of the end.

It's quite addictive - selecting around 10 koi in the pan net and seeing if there's one there that might help me achieve my project aim. Sometimes you find one, sometimes not - then it's onto the next pan net's worth to keep up the search.

We hold the fry temporarily in these cage nets, and I'm using the pan net and the "spoon" net Amanda made to carry out the selections.


The keepers went in this floating basket; I was hoping to take pics of some individuals but we ran out of time

We introduced them into the growing on tank, and they have settled in very well. They are in good health, and eating well.


Tonight I kept a few back, and here's a close up of some of them. I have better ones, but these were the best 8 from around 400 koi I went through this evening.

And the same selection from a different angle


I feel a massive sense of satisfaction that I've produced all these koi even though there are a lot less than I was hoping to harvest. It's enough to select from and gives us a chance to practice selection and get our setup right.

I've been filling my spawning vats for another set of spawnings. "Horseshoe" fry pond is full and cycling through the green stage, so it should be just right to receive the fry in about 10 days time.

I fixed a couple of holes in the liner on "Chestnut" pond, and I've started filling it. The level has stopped going up so there must still be a leak . What a pain! I'll take another look tomorrow around the water line. I'm starting to run short on the number of warm weeks we have left this summer to bring this next lot of fry on to the 1 inch stage, so time is once again against me. For that reason, if I don't find any obvious leaks, I'll ditch the liner and put a new silage liner in.

I'll start the Kujaku spawning tomorrow afternoon and I'm going with the refined spawning technique I trialed about a month ago Fingers crossed it goes off ok this weekend. I'll let you know.