COLOR IN KOI FISH

Since Koi are a man made fish they are not exact colors. Koi colors can easily change by the food they eat and water conditions.

            In October the fish are at their peak in color in my mud pond.  The biggest reason appears to be that they have stopped growing as I have stopped feeding and instead of Koi pellets they are mostly feeding on algae.  Possibly the colder water plays a factor.  Yet it is quite noticeable that looking at fish of the same age the smaller ones have better colors. 

            Japanese call these fish finished as their colors are at their prime and they can fetch a better price.  The ones that have not got their colors fully developed are called later fish.  Most jumbo fish that are over 80cm reach their prime over the age of 6.  A lot of fish might not reach that prime state until the age of 10.

            The Koi enthusiast usually look for the better colors which are in most cases fish that have completed growing and will not reach a large size.  Observing 60 fish less than 2 years old from 3 different breeders that have been kept at  temperatures of 68F all winter and not fed any artificial food.  All the fish from 3 different breeders even being brothers and sisters displayed different growth rates, all being Go Sanke variety.  So all continued red or hi as it is called.  Now there are orange based hi and purple based hi.  The brighter purple based hi these being a higher grade Koi from better breeders, was found only on the Tancho fish.  The reason that it is closer to the Japanese flag color and also that there is only a smaller area to be developed.   If 2 fish of the same size are compared the one with a lot of high does not seem as bright a red as the one with just a little.  Just as though their bodies could produce only so much.  The ones with a lot of hi appeared a lot more orange.  I am told that given time and when the growth slows down both fish will have the same color of hi.  The Japanese do not favour the purple based hi as they do not consider it as nice and it has been found not to be as stable.  Not that Matsunosuke, considered one of the greatest of all time, can guarantee hi.  Out of 35 young fish one Kohaku has lost it’s hi completely at age 18 months.

            From the young fish Matsunosuke had the best hi quality, but on bringing them in from my mud pond in Nov I noticed that a few had carp pox which quickly was gone when put into a heated pond.  The Momotaro fish showed the weakest hi, especially the ones that grew the most.  Since they are not yet 2 and some of them close to 20in it is only to be expected that they are lighter areas around each scale.  The fish from Taiwan although only 6 in number proved themselves the worst for the money as the growth rate was not as good and poor hi for their size as well some hi bleeding and some developed shimmies, greatly reducing the value.  I would suggest that the pairing of fish was very poor.  When I go to Japan I will watch out for such fish as they are showing growth potential.  Not so the ones with great hi.  Or the purplish deep red hi that seems to bleed a little more around the edges, in fact any bleeding at all around the edges of hi seems to be an indication of hi instability.