Water Gardening: Rethinking a koi pond, 1 by snapple45

snapple45 wrote:
There is definitely an expense. However, a larger pond is absolutley easier to manage than a smaller one and NOT more costly on a per gallon scale. I have two ponds one for goldfish - shubunkins and comets ( 480 gal ) and the 2500 gal koi pond. Once balanced and mature there's a surprisingly modest difference between the two in terms of cost and work. This koi is one of my favorites and she's a big fat female that will spawn.

It does take three years to get to understand ponding if you're beginning from scratch ( no previous indoor aquarium experience) and for the pond itself to mature. After that you probably won't experience too much in terms of fish loss if the filtration is good you're doing the right maintenance. Stuff will happen but mostly minor. I havn't lost a fish to parasites - ever! I did lose some fish initially to septcemia and some to ulcers, both from not managing the water quality properly. I did overfeed which is a bad-bad thing to do. I had rocks in the pond bottom. That's a really bad-bad thing to do. Now the pond bottom is clean and I definitely don't overfeed. I also don't feed cheap food. Cheap food isn't really cheap. The koi aren't as healthy and cheap food fouls the water. I haven't lost a fish to disease for 4 yrs. I've never lost a fish to winter kill.

So, you can see all the mistakes I made early on. Overfeeding. Not springing for the best quality koi food. Thinking that a rocked, gravel bottom was pretty and wouldn't be a haven for bad bacteria. Those mistakes cost me some koi. The only mistake I didn't make was overstocking. I started with 4 - 6" koi in 2500 gallons and added koi slowly as the filter came in. There was never an ammonia spike. Never.

This is doable ladies and gentlemen, and very rewarding.