Been preparing for over a week and I finally reached the point where I could actually start selecting.
The prep has been:
- change the bottom drain on the tank to a flat, flush drain cover instead of the vertical pipe
- jet wash one of my large cage nets, to get the eggs off from the last spawning.; then set it up in one of the fry tanks
- seine net the pond several times to collect all the fish and move them into the cage net. There must be well over a thousand moved, and I counted around 10 that I'm quite excited about. Just need to find them again when I do the selections.
- then.... divide the cage net into two sections. the unselected portion, and another portion to take the discards.
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| Just so you know, the pipe hides my six pack. Getting in was the quickest way to change the drains - and the water was a balmy 25 degrees when I took the plunge |
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| Moving the fish from the seine net (on the left) and into a cage net (on the right) |
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| A typical pan net's worth of fish to select through. Big variation in size - the smallest ones are probably escapees from a cage net holding the 1 inchers that we're moving on. The largest one was almost 4 inches long. All of the fish in this pan net were moved into the discard cage net - none of them are keepers :-( Reason being - there needs to be white on the nose for me to keep a fish at this stage. |
From the first 265 reviewed, just 15 to be kept until the next selection.
Here are a few of the ones from that first batch that I'm growing on - these were moved back into the pond they came from.
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| A bit small, , but it has a white nose and potentially a reasonable pattern. Selection decision - hand on to this one until 3rd selection |
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| again, a bit on the small side - but nice white nose and red pattern mostly above the lateral line. I tolerated the red in the fins at this stage. The red on the eye is a shame, but may be I'm being too picky. Selection decision - hold on to this one until 3rd selection; monitor red in fins. |
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| this one was a good size. nice wide mouth, and good shine line across the dorsal ridge. white nose, red above the lateral line, no red in the fins. all good... except - the rear half of the fish has far too little red pattern. Selection decision - hang on to this one - and see how the pattern develops. I think this one could grow quite well,. |
I found one particularly unusual koi - it's red all over, with a large black spot on its head; basically a black tancho spot. I couldnt get a picture of it with light fading... but I'm holding on to it, and it one to keep an eye out for at the next selection.
