is this a koi?

[cemantic]

My wife and I have been trying to figure out if this guy is a koi.  We just brought our goldfish in for the winter from our pond we built this spring and just got them into a 110 gallon tank.  We thought we had all goldfish but this one grew way more over the summer then the other three that were about his size to start out with in the beginning of july.




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[babblefish1960]

Though it has some oddities about its head shape, it is actually a koi, as indicated by the reverse barbels.

[Crumpet]

I agree with babble, looks like a koi to me as well -- mostly because of the moustache

[renadia]

Yep definitively a Koi    Nice surprise  see it's just like one of mine it has mustache.

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[Vizerdrix]

Beautiful fella!  I like the solid colours. How big is he?  I just got a small koi a couple of months ago, and he's already grown 1"-2"! 

[cemantic]

thanks for the replies

It was a nice surprise to see him/her when we brought them in.  He is about seven inches give or take.

A question, is there anything different we should be considering for food for him that is different then what we may do for the rest of the gang of all goldfish?  Is there a diet that people know of for goldfish and koi that will enhance their colors?  These guys came out of the pond way more colorful and healthy looking then when we first bought them and put them in.  Very rich colors.  it is fun having them inside where you can see them better.

[KLKelly]

I have had a blast with feeding my goldfish.  There was a post on koivet this morning about supplementing a high quality sinking food with a variety of other foods.  Some I haven't tried yet. 

I will add here though that need a varied diet, they are omniverouse. So add fruit and vegies to the diet. No corn, but you can feed them things like green beans, broccoli, squash etc. Steamed and cut bit size, and fresh or frozen, not canned (too much salt).

Orange, strawberry, blueberry's, kiwi, even watermelon. Its a trial and error thing though, don't get discouraged as sometimes it takes time for them to decide what they like and don't. Cocktail or salad shrimp are also good

My goldfish love blanched zucchini (spelling), blanched kale on a clip, blood worms, mysis shrimp, cocktail shrimp, romaine letuce (not as much), peas.  They go crazy or peices of orange but it makes the tank really mucky so I only rarely feed it before a big water change day.  I have two tanks where one fish in each has a swimbladder disorder so they rarely get pellets/food with grains in it.  Before they developed floating issues they loved the mazuri gel formula I bought and gelfood (made with anchovie and peas and kale).

I've read on some people feed their single tails/koi a type of clay - betonite or something like that.

On the Goldfish And Aquarium Board forum - the second link down is a section called the Goldfish Diner. Tons of posts you may be interested in reading.  There are some gelfood recipes here. http://thegab.org/forum/index.php

[CMW]

The clay used is generally sold as Bentonite, but goes by other names including montmorillonite.  It is supposed to help them eliminate toxins such as heavy metals (supposed to do the same for people too) with the effect of making them brighter in colour.  The practice of consuming clays is called pelotherapy and there is a fair bit of info on it on the internet.  A good intro site is http://www.eytonsearth.org/

For koi the options seem to be to either have them ingest it by coating their food in the powdered clay or to add it to the water.  I am going to try the coating their food.  I think the adding it to their water option might get a bit messy in a tank.

If you want to try it I found internal grade bentonite clay at the naturopathic pharmacy in Ottawa at the corner of O'Connor and Slater.  I think it was around $5 for 100 g.

If I ever get around to trying it I will post my results.

[Vizerdrix]

Mine will eat practically ANYTHING I put in the tank for them!   Both species do well on the same diet.

I supplement their regular pellet diet with blood worms, mysis shrimp, frozen goldfish food, and fresh greens (organic lettuce and leaf vegetables). 

The reason they have more vibrant colours when just brought in from outside is that they get to feed on a lot of stuff they normally don't get in an aquarium: live insect larva, live insects and other small critters, even the algae in the pond.  I've always said a natural diet is much better than a processed one!