A week in the life of a koi farmer (wc 20_6)

Earlier this week we spawned LMC, which is one of our well known showa females.  Here she is being sedated ready for an artificial spawning.  You can see the males in the background, still in the spawning net and they too will be sedated, the milt stripped and then mixed with the eggs before being laid by us on ropes elsewhere for hatching.

 

It's always an important night when we tackle our well known and already optimised breeding lines.  The spawning went well; she produced a good volume of eggs and fertilisation was reasonable , although a little under average; but still usable percentage.

 

And, as I write this blog post the hatchlings are in the process of coming up for their first gulp of air and in a few days we should have some free swimming showa hatchlings.  So we are just waiting to see now how the hatch has gone, and how successful this spawning has been.

 

Other news; the kohaku fry in ponds 3 and 5 are pretty much there now in terms of being at harvest size.  They've come along really well in the second half of June and we need to schedule the harvests along side the other jobs that are also urgent, like another round of spawnings and repairing nets over the fry ponds with hatchlings to protect against heron attack.

 

The Opaline spawning seem to have taken in fry pond 2 outside.  They are so difficult to spot agains the brown/black/green bottom of the pond, and it's only as they grow that we can more easily spot the fry.  And, grow they have been.  The growth rate has been absolutely phenomenal.  As good as we have ever achieved, which is in part down to the pond being in a good state when the fry entered, but is also very likely down to Opaline passing on superior growth potential in her genes.

 

It's always a slightly nervy time as we wait to see the fry population of the pond, and therefore whether this will be a good harvest for us.  The early signs look promising, with the great growth of the fry we have been able to spot and in another week or so we will have a better idea on the success of the pond.

Assuming the LMC spawning delivers, we are then onto filling and populating the last of our 6 fry ponds.  Before harvesting the fry ponds laid back in May and preparing them for a second go.  In the middle of all of that, we have a stand at the BKKS National Koi show next weekend and we also hosted the Koi Diaries Grow and Show last weekend.  The latter was once again a great event, and I'll drop some pictures and video from the event in a future blog post.

 

To end this blog post, please enjoy these short clips of the fry enjoying life in the sun at Byer Koi Farm.