Indoor winter plywood tank for koi

[koikeepr]

ok. hold on a second. First of all, there's nothing wrong with feeding 3x per day. I feed mine 3-5x per day.

If they're putting on a inch per month, you're doing great--they'll be huge at maturity.

BUT, a 90% water change once a month is not proper. Do a water change every week or two of 20%. Better to do smaller water changes more often than 1 big one less often.

No more "radical" moves James....stick to a solid and reasonable program.

 

[huskerfan]

As for feeding them. Yeah, I'm definitely over feeding them. I feed them 3x a day... Most are putting on 1" a month. I do change 90% once a month and have so since my pond cycled 6+ months ago. All koi are in excellent health after pond cycled. Don't seem to have any fluke problems anymore. Couldn't find any last time many months ago and I just scraped and scoped two koi moments ago.



Besides the yellow water, I don't see any issues, even with once a month epic 90% water changes. And I do not recommend anyone doing that.[/QUOTE]

Hi James, I'm studying reading your basement pond project again right now, I wish I had the room, I really like your setup.
So why don't you put your pond (water) on a diet? your koi will still grow at same rate with less stress, be nice to your koi and change the water 10% weekly.

Also, I noticed in the photos the pond water level is low? Being a small pond I'd think you'd want as much water as possible? How often do you clean out your first filter? I read last night something about it getting clogged up after 3 weeks?

Mark

 

[huskerfan]

ok. hold on a second. First of all, there's nothing wrong with feeding 3x per day. I feed mine 3-5x per day.


Sorry, I don't recall saying that 3-5 daily feeding were wrong, I'm saying I think James is overfeeding and grossly overloading his system. I feed my koi in the summer when I'm home 3-5,6,7 times over the corse of the day ...its just not alot at once.

 

[jameskoi]

Alright... Water level was low b/c I took those pictures while changing water.

Let's quantify the food they get. They get about 1/2 lbs food a day. I think I have 31 koi in there. Most were small but they have become monsters now. I believe I am over feeding them because a bunch of them are too fat but they're growing the fastest lengthwise too.

I'm going to do some math right now to see if I am indeed over feeding them.

So I'm guessing 25 of them are 12"+ and of that 25, maybe 10 of them over 14". Biggest one is 16.5". I pulled two today to check for parasites. 14.5"/2.38lbs (was 9" in May) 16.5"/2.70lbs (was 10.5" in May). I reckon there is at least 30lbs of fish in there (maybe mostly made of fat, i dunno - lol). Maybe actual weight is closer to 40lbs.

Okay.. so I'm feeding them 1.57% of total fish mass based on 30lbs. I think I am under feeding them now!

As for pond. It's ~1500G of water in there (not including filters). New problem: It's a way over stocked pond but filters are doing its job and is keeping up besides the nitrates and whatever organic junk that needs to be removed... Hence I do 90% water changes. Doing 10-20% a week will do no justice.

One of my 55G drum is for mechanical filtration. That gets cleaned out every 3 weeks. If only I can climb in there and use my feet to squish out the poo instead of my hands.

BTW, huskerfan, thx for compliments about the filter setup. As you probably know, it went through radical face lift and now is still functioning beyond my expectations. I don't know how much longer. The koi growth haven't slowed down nor will I cut down on food feedings (yet).

 

[huskerfan]

Hi James,

I think you have a great set-up and I want to see the koi do well, but I think we can both agree it's overtaxed and the results are starting to show. The yellow water is likely D.O.C. dissolved organic compounds.

Last suggestion then I'll stop.... if possible clean the mechanical filter weekly and water 20% weekly.

One advantage to a basement or inside tank is, I can hook up a hose with sprayer and use hot water to wash out crap from the filters!

Also, it's a thought but you may look at building a bakki shower, from what I've read they work great removing/reducing nitrates, phosphorous and d.o.c. I'm thinking I might build a small one for my basement tank...the more oxygen and cleaner water the better.

(btw, are you using warm/hot water to refill tank? hard water is really hard (non pun intended) on the koi.)

good luck,

Mark

 

[jameskoi]

Thanks for the info, Mark.

When I notice any signs of health issues, I will do something about it. I've been actually feeding these guys same amount for 4+ months.

I told all 3 local koi store about my filter setup. 2 said awesome and 1 just laughed at my system (using scrub pads) and wished me good luck.

I suppose my fish are guinea pigs but they're healthy right now. I will adjust accordingly if I notice any problems.

As for using hot water cleaning my mechanical filter. I don't do that, I just clean and flush with pond water. My mechanical does great bio filtering too.

When adding new water into pond, the temperature is matched to pond water temp. It takes pretty much whole day to fill the pond. Mainly waiting for hot water tank (3x) with 3F drop at the end.

For massive water changes, must keep pH and temperature the same...

 

[koiguy1969]

i bet the one who laughed had some really great media to sell you too, right?.. i use one single barrel and am definately over stocked yet my water parameters are always ideal... of course i dont feed like you do. i do a filter flush every 5 days and replace that much water.so roughly 50 gals every 5 days or 150 gallons every 2 weeks. i have 2 dozen fish + 40 2" fry in my baement pond which is only 800 gals. i flush the filter in about a minute but trickle the refill over an hour and a half. i have yet to have any health problems with my fish. i guess im just not in that much of a rush to grow them out.

 

[jameskoi]

koiguy: You're the other dude here that I know of with overstocked pond.

Going through fish tables and bio load charts, it's way off the charts. All ammonia and nitrite are currently zero some hours after they finish pooing. Of course, nitrates are very high.

Recently an old friend popped by to see my pond. I was telling him how surprised that my home made filter was doing. We were having some beers and he asked if he could to take a leak in the pond. I said, sure, go for it. Before pee, ammonia was zero. 10mins after the taking a leak, it measured around 0.25ppm. LOL! Water flowing out of filter was zero.

 

[DrDave]

Now that is funny!

 

[koiguy1969]

cool, so now i have a 4th bathroom?... you think i can list it that way for sale?

 

[Dave 54]

Very well thought out and put together do you mind me asking how many gallons does your filter clean and return in an hour?
We have a similar sort of a setup but factory made in the UK the Shoreham QT tank is considerd amongst koi keepers to be the Rolls Royce of QT systems .
It has a bottom drainage system for drainage a large filter run by a blagdon 2000 submersable Pond pump with a kockney koi 15 watt U/V-C and is around about the same gallonage but in imperial gallons not US
This one isn't mine but it gives you an idea of what they look like, you can see the filter chamber and its size also the bottom drain and the pipework coming from the UV-C
note also the vent.
For a better look at it click on the magnifyer to bring out all the detail, ours is a hell of alott cleaner than this one

rgrds

Dave

View attachment Shorham tank.bmp

 

[Dave 54]

ok. hold on a second. First of all, there's nothing wrong with feeding 3x per day. I feed mine 3-5x per day.

If they're putting on a inch per month, you're doing great--they'll be huge at maturity.

BUT, a 90% water change once a month is not proper. Do a water change every week or two of 20%. Better to do smaller water changes more often than 1 big one less often.

No more "radical" moves James....stick to a solid and reasonable program.

Hey hold on a minute I ued to do a 70% once a month to our indoor koi tank and our koi where some of the healthiest looking koi around, we would feed three times a day with no problem.
And we did it this way for 22 years without a problem so each to their own way of doing things I stick up for koiguy on this .
I show koi too and hav a whole heap of glassware from best in size this is a an all koi show I may add
the koi responded beautifully we even have two koi who have lived with us for 26 years now 22 indoors and 4 outside since ill health forced a move out doors check out the photo's in our pond build if you dont believe me

rgrds

Dave