Need to get rid of some koi (SoCal)

[noz45]

My grandma is way past the age to care for her koi pond and needs to get rid of all her koi. She wants to have them go all at once to one person or institution and not have to deal with individuals who just select the best/healthy ones. The problem is that some of the koi have visible signs of sickness and therefore all of them are possibly sick/infected.

The Japanese pond is outdoors and roughly 30' x 15' x 5' and she probably has around 100-200 koi of all sizes and ages (range between 6in. to 2ft. approximately). The fish population was originally started around 1975 when my grandpa bought the koi and made the pond. Located in Los Angeles.

So, some questions:
1. Is anyone interested in taking all the koi?
2. Are there any institutions/organizations that will accept all the koi?
3. What other options are there for getting rid of the possibly sick koi?

I can also provide pictures if necessary. Thanks for reading and I appreciate any advice you can offer!

 

[DrDave]

You have several problems here. That many healthy Koi are very hard if not impossible to place. No-one is going to take the sick Koi.

Institutions will not accept Koi if they are not top notch and come from a known reputable source.

Your best bet is to quarantine the sick from the others and see if any more get sick. It might be the overpopulation without adequete maintenance that is causeing it. Reducing the load, then doing a filter cleaning and water change might ensure no more get sick.

If she is afraid of people cherry picking the best, then don't offer the best first. Seperate the ones you want to find homes for first then the others will go quickly when the time comes.

You may have to cull the sick ones. Does she have a deep freezer? The best way to humanely put down a koi is to slowly chill it till it goes to sleep, then freeze them. It is painless and they do not suffer. I hate to do it, but sometimes you have no choice.

I would help more if I could. Please do not set them loose into the eco system.

 

[noz45]

Thanks for the suggestions DrDave. I'm going today to assess the situation and try the quarantine suggestion. Maybe I can heal/cure the ones with less severe health issues.

Unfortunately, we don't have a freezer big enough to humanely freeze the koi. But I was looking up other methods and thought that FINQUEL/MS-222 might be a good alternative as it is both FDA and AVMA approved for humane euthanasia.

Once again, thanks for your help and input.

 

[stroppy]

cant be much help .. but i hope you manage to get at least some of them well enough to be rehomed :0)

 

[c2c7390]

How many koi do you have and how big are they. im in Anaheim, ca area so im not that far from you

 

[c2c7390]

nevermind that last post i missed the answer to my questions. i could take all of the smaller ones but the 2 feet ones are too big for me