A week in the life of a koi farmer (wc 9_12)

The season's past so fast...  and we're back to the misty mornings of our UK winter.

I've been selecting through our 2022 spawnings this week, covering half of our growing on systems and with the other systems scheduled for selections before Christmas.

There's some fantastic quality coming through, from varieties and lines we are already known for and also from the new lines we tried out this year.

Kohaku, Showa, Chagoi, Asagi...  these are all on target and we will have a great selection across all the sizes and price points in the spring.

The new pairings run in 2022 were Doitsu Ochiba and Mukashi Ogon, from our very special and very large female we've named 'Opaline'...    Both spawnings have delivered! With the Mukashi's, we will have a good range throughout the koi mixes and tosai sizes in the spring. On the Doitsu Ochiba, there will be a good range in tosai sizes in the spring too, but less in the small koi mixes.  The quality on both spawnings is at the top end of what we hoped to achieve.  The Mukashi's off 'Opaline' have fantastic shine, and the body structures show real quality just like the mum; and this is what we look for when we invest heavily in a mum like 'Opaline'.   I took a short clip of a few of the tosai coming through and you can see the substantial head's and bodies where the volume continues from front to back.  Thick and strong peduncles rounding them off.  Really happy with these!

The Doitsu Ochiba's also gave me huge satisfaction to review this week, and we will have a selection for you in the spring; more than last year, but less than say our Kohaku offerings.

We also have Aka Matsuba's and Karashigoi too.  And, the late doitsu metallics spawning are so far behind everything else that I don't expect to release most of those until mid summer '23 at the earliest.

Here's a video montage with clips from the last week.