Koi Olympics

[Dave in Innisfil]

I've seen some real wierd behavior in Roy, our resident koi, since the arrival and addition of the new fish. Yesterday, several times I saw him launching himself right out of the water, just like a bass. At first I thought he was trying to disturb the food pellets lying on the water lily leaves. The new fish have begun to surface feed and they're is quite the competition now between them and the others for the food. We also have recently had a proliferation of dragon flies skimming our pond I thought he might be chasing.
I re-routed the air from my temporary pump to the stone to the centre of the pond, and his jumping stopped.

As Tina and I sat pondside last evening, Roy seemed to be sleeping just inches below the water surface, with no interest in food. Another strange behavior for him. He usually sleeps under one of the plant stands. I'm hoping he didn't injure himself (looks fine, no wounds) with all that jumping yesterday.

Any ideas ? Is it psyciatric help he needs, now no longer being the only big fish in the pond ?

[Jackie Ramo]

When fish start jumping the first thing that jumps to my mind is parasites... jumping to shake them off. Not eating is a very bad sign and also makes one think of parasites. While the new fish may be used to their fleas, Roy would not be.

Any gasping at the surface?

[Tamianth]

I certainly agree with Jackie on this one. The wild antics don't sound right.... :(

[Dave in Innisfil]

I thought over two weeks in a Desafin quarantine was suppose to get rid of things like fleas and parasites from the new fish. Roy's still eating, and today seems to be acting more his grumpy ol' normal self, remaining hidden unless provoked and occassionally rising to a floating pellet. Last night being a full moon, I thought it might have something to do with that, remembering that orca's do aerial displays during courtship.His odd behavior wasn't repeated today, so I can only keep my fingers crossed it was the joys of added companionship and not some kind of bug.

None of the fish are gasping. I'm still trying to source parts for my deep air pump, but between 3 waterfalls and a large aquarium air pump, I hoped that's enough. I can make some water turbulence in the top pond by aiming the input pipe to the surface, to increase the 02, just to be sure.

[Jackie Ramo]

Keep an eye on him. He's a strong fish and may shake anything. OTOH he may have been jumping at the moon. I have a jumper who just likes to jump, or so it seems. I have seen him jump out and catch a hornet so bugs in the air as well as those pesky fleas in the water can cause jumping. It just makes me nervous when fish jump soon after new fish have been added.

[Dave in Innisfil]

Roy has taken to hiding out around our skimmer, just a few inches below the surface. It gave me a chance to take a good look at him, but I wouldn't know what to specifically look for. He looked fine to me, just basking in the sunlight and warm surface water. I tossed him some pellets, to which he bolted around the pond and went airborne again. I'm also concerned that his new hiding place is also a good ambush spot for racoons.

[Merlin]

Dave if I were you I would knock him out and do a srape, something is not right.

The jumping could be parasites, but the choosing a spot to hide away is more worrying. :( Keep a very close eye on him and keep us updated.

[Dave in Innisfil]

I'm in agreement with you, Merlin, that all is not right in Roy's world. In re-arranging the plants in our main pond, I removed two large view-blocking iris that he previously hid under within the milk crate bases. But last night under the spotlight I found he was not alone in his new hide-out, he was joined by three of the new fish, and a couple of goldies. This location is where uneaten food pellets can accumulate, where the skimmer discharges, and the safest place from our kingfisher preditor. It's currently also the only place in our pond with any real form of underwater current, during daylight hours when I turn on the skimmer. I did see a large worm-like attachment to a front fin, but it looked more like a long piece of poo. I'm thinking of netting it and taking a closer look without actually handling the fish. I don't know how to "knock him out", have a microscope at my disposal, but wouldn't know what abnormal to look for yet.

Could he/she be spawning or preparing to spawn ? Everything else is breeding in our pond, and with the introduction of more koi, and seeing foam at the base of our waterfalls, it makes me wonder.

[Jackie Ramo]

Dave, he may be unhappy to have his world moved around. Also in moving the plants you could have stirred up parasites that like to live in the debris. Although it sounds like they have found a good spot to rest, food that comes to them, a nice current, safe from preditors.... who says fish are stupid :grin:

[Dave in Innisfil]

This morning, Roy was lined up with the others for the early morning feeding. Last night he was doing his shark-like patrol of the pond, but no aerials as we've seen the past few days. The new fish quickly took over the new rock lair, so he's having to look elsewhere for sanctuary.

That worm-like thingy is gone, and the only noticeable difference is that he was floating with his head lower than his tail. He doesn't seem to like the feeding frenzy, and usually waits for the crowd to die down to eat, if there's anything left. He's never been a great surface eater, and the new fish put him to shame in entertainment value. They too like to wait for the goldies and shubs to clear, and then gobble up everything left. Between all the fish, I'm feeding about half a margarine container of garlic-enhanced pellets a day.

I imagine my saline level is near 0 in the pond. I had read that just before ice up and after my last water change, the ponds should get a healthy dose of salt. Should I be waiting ? I'd much rather salt than medicate 10,000 gallons.

[Jackie Ramo]

Its considered old fashioned to salt ones pond these days. The thinking is the higher salt rate just hardens the bacteria and bugs to that salt level so that when you need to salt you then need to salt and rate that canharm the fish in order to impact the bugs.

Heads down tail up is not good... but often they are just looking at things on the bottom and not really resting that way. Tweet, my old guy comes in each winter because he goes head down tails up when the water hit 50F. This is from damage caused a few years ago when he nearly died with all the rest of my fish.

[Merlin]

Yep agree heads down is not a good sign, but................then again I have an orffe with a damaged spine that is allways head down, and yes he has his favourite spot under the lilly pads, 9 times out of 10 when I go to the pond he is in the same place. That is untill I rattle the food container on the side of the pond :-) . I still keep an eye on him though just in case.

[Jackie Ramo]

How's Roy doing now Dave?

[Dave in Innisfil]

Roy seems to be 100% back to his grumpy normal self, begrudging the goldies and shubs their feeding frenzy. My mum fin and fur-kid sat the past couple of days while we were outta town getting Tina another medical consultation for her kidney ailment. All the fish and dogs look fat and healthy, as grandma's are allowed to spoil and treat at their leisure and discretion. She loves to sit pond side, and we howled with her annecdotes of fish and dog behaviour in our absense. Her favourite are the multi-coloured shubs, who's activity is in stark contrast to the two Siamese fighting fish she lovingly travels with in separate pickle jars......LOL

[Jackie Ramo]

Glad to hear the fish had a wonderful sitter. Sorry Tina is having problems.

Fish can sometimes shake off things and sometimes they just don't like changes to their living quarters. Hard to tell somedays which is which

[Dave in Innisfil]

There are moments when all the work that goes along with ponding is forgotten. Watching my 76 year old mother feeding our fish, one pellet at a time, half pellets for the babies, puts a large dent in the pond's payback for the trials and tribulations we experienced this year. By her departure today, she intimately knew every fish, had favourites, knew which were koi, which were gluttons, which were shy, and even which she suspected were females.

Whether or not she remembers all this until her next visit....... :lol:

[Jackie Ramo]

:lol: Sounds like she enjoys the pond as much as you do!!! If she has absorbed all that info I'm sure most of it will be there for the return visit provided its not next year. My mother took one look at the fish and said, I bet they eat a lot, and moved on. No interest at all.

[Dave in Innisfil]

I gotta laugh, because my mum also showed concern for the quantity of pet food between the pups and fish. Hence, the one pellet at a time feeding.

[Jackie Ramo]

I hope the dogs got more than a kibble each !wow!