Dragonflys Showa and Kohaku Growout

[dragonfly1976]

Our growouts arrived today and look spectacular!! We got 1 Showa and Kohaku to fatten up this summer. Frank did a great job of packing and shipping the fish, no stress at all on them. They are now in the QT tank with some other koi and eating already.
Here are some pics taken after their arrival. Enjoy.
Showa 8"
Kohaku 10" (Look at that whale tail)

[icu2]

:yahoo: They look great!

[dragonfly1976]

Thanks! This should be a fun growout. The way my wife feeds the fish we should be able to put 6-10" on these this year.:cheer2:

[Midorigoi]

Hey my showa has puffy cheeks like your kohaku, not as prominent tho ! That one's going to be big :D:

[Spartan]

Just noticed another WNYer! This cold spring has us a little slow out of the starting blocks, but looks like you have a good pair there. Good luck!

[dragonfly1976]

Thanks. No slow start for us. Pumps already up for a week. Water temp is 52 degrees in the greenhouse and rising. This weeks project is a Birdman sand and gravel filter. We can't wait to see how it will work for our pond. Ponds are never completely done.

[chag]

You pick two nice koi , they are BIG .Keep pictures of development coming. Good luck.

[fishin4cars]

Interesting two choices. Should be fun watching these two grow. I like the skin on the kohaku even though it's heavy beni it's still got a lot of appeal.

[Spartan]

I ve got mine in indoor qt. pond is still covered :(

[dragonfly1976]

Showa #31 was my wife's first pick and the Kohaku was actually a leftover(#15) that no one picked. We have them in QT in the basement. Yes the beni on the Kohaku is heavy but it is making a nice separation towards the tail. It will be interesting to see how this one develops.

[dragonfly1976]

I have the QT tank heated up to 72 degrees and the fish are eating and doing well. Haven't seen any noticeable growth yet, but they eat like pigs. Soon when outside temps get higher around here, we will release them into the pond where we should see some real growth. What temp does everyone else keep their QT tank at?

[icu2]

I was keeping mine at about 70*... but have since dropped it down a bit towards *60... closer to the "exercise pond" temp.
I think 2 weeks might be a little early to be looking for noticeable growth. :D:

[montwila]

I think you did fine. #15 was going up against #13 on the grow out photo's (wonder who could have gotten that one, Steve). People did not pick #09 or #23 either so I guess the heavy patterns were not favored very strongly for this grow out. It does have a nice Odome IMHO.
Speculating on what my mentor says about my fish. The beni in #15 dorsal's probably will not pull all the way down because it appears to be the full height of the dorsal. So how much the seperation developes between the front and back will remain to be seen, since the dorsals beni is right above that area. Should be fun to watch. What will be really neat about this fish is if it gets above 24" and very thick, the shiroji (I may have the wrong term) might show all the way around that heavy beni pattern framing it in. Those peck fins look a little on the small side for that size fish, wouldn't it be funny to get a female from the left overs? Although I am no credible judge, take every thing I say with a grain or two of salt.

Best of luck

[icu2]

I think you did fine. #15 was going up against #13 on the grow out photo's (wonder who could have gotten that one, Steve). People did not pick #09 or #23 either so I guess the heavy patterns were not favored very strongly for this grow out. It does have a nice Odome IMHO.
Speculating on what my mentor says about my fish. The beni in #15 dorsal's probably will not pull all the way down because it appears to be the full height of the dorsal. So how much the seperation developes between the front and back will remain to be seen, since the dorsals beni is right above that area. Should be fun to watch. What will be really neat about this fish is if it gets above 24" and very thick, the shiroji (I may have the wrong term) might show all the way around that heavy beni pattern framing it in. Those peck fins look a little on the small side for that size fish, wouldn't it be funny to get a female from the left overs? Although I am no credible judge, take every thing I say with a grain or two of salt.

Best of luck

:whistle:

[dragonfly1976]

Thanks for your input on this growout. This is a learning experience for me on both fish, especially the Kohaku. Might take it a couple of years to get these up to 24" though. The tail on the Kohoku is huge, I don't know if that is an indicator of its potential growth either.

[dragonfly1976]

Fish are now out of quarantine and enjoying themselves with the herd. They did well in quarantine but I am not one to prolong it if all checks out. After all, who does well in solitary confinement? Growth was maybe 1/2", but now that they have room and a strong current they will grow faster. Will post pics soon of their new home.

[dragonfly1976]

Our 2 grow outs are growing a lot and eating very well . Probably an inch on each fish. You can see from the pics that they are filling out with girth also.:yes:

[icu2]

They look great! :thumb:

[lifeoffaith]

Looking good!

[Spartan]

Kohaku looks like it has very good conformation. I think a water ripple and the camera angle make the showa's head look shorter than it is based on the original pics, but it definitely seems to be bulking up. Looks you you're making a strong showing for WNY!

[player30]

I think the showa is beautiful--so interesting. And kohakus are my favorite.

[dragonfly1976]

The Kohaku with heavy beni is starting to lose it behind its head in a line. This looks interesting if anything as the beni needed a break up front. I will try to get a pic of it soon. They are really growing!

[icu2]

:pop2:

[dragonfly1976]

Ok, here is an updated photo of the grow outs. They are about 12" long each right now. The kohaku has some interesting things going on. At first I thought this was a wound/scrape, but the beni is cutting through on the back of its head.

[icu2]

:thumb: They're looking good!

[montwila]

Looks interesting. I have heard several times " I had a fish from .................... and they do this............. after.............. That is why I wanted to get several fish from the same source. To watch how they develop. Even our grow out combined cannot predict future Purdin fish as we do not know everything that has been put into these fish. But it will give us some insight.

Any photo's from the Left side of the fish? Has the beni in the dorsal started to pull down any? It looks like it might be.

Nice growth from my perspective. What have your water temperatures been this summer. Also your PH?

[dragonfly1976]

Water temps this summer have been around 70 with all of this rain. The PH is standard from our town water and is perfect. Water quality isn't an issue either. I don't see the beni rolling back anywhere else. Here is a LH pic.

[jimfish98]

Any new updates?

[jimfish98]

Don't forget to get measurements and enter your grow outs into the Virtual Koi/Goldfish show, see how well your selecting and husbandry stacks against the others in the grow out.

[dragonfly1976]

Update:

Here are the Showa and Kohaku updated pics! Its too hard to catch them with the greenhouse cover on so I will have to wait for that later. (the pole from the net always hits it).

Each fish reached at least 16-17" in the fall. The showa has brilliant color, while the kohaku's beni is starting to separate behind the head.

[icu2]

:like: I can't wait for warmer weather... thanks for the update!

[OCKOIANDGARDEN]

Thanks for the pics.

[Redman8102]

Showa is starting to look very nice… can't wait to see them bowled in warmer weather…:like:


Love seeing people actually posting pix of their grow out koi!!