A Few Tips On Keeping Your Koi Healthy

Koi health is of paramount importance if you want to enjoy your fish for a long time. Koi fish are known to live for decades even though the usual life span is 20 to 30 years. Koi are hardy and tough; but, they can get sick. Their life expectancy depends mainly on genetics and living conditions.

The modern koi are resilient but they have lost much of the resiliency of their ancestor, the magoi carp. They can thrive in the poorest water conditions and stay unaffected by the existence of parasites. This is because of the inbreeding process that started long ago when nishikigoi was first being established. Breeders needed to pair koi with parents and siblings to obtain the ideal body shape, intense colors and beautiful patterns that make the present koi so admirable.

Nonetheless, the koi of today rarely get sick and if they get sick or perish, you can find the underlying cause to water quality problems. Similar threats to koi health are parasites, ulcer disease, predators, medicine overdose, jumping out of the water, virus infections, toxic pesticide sprays, and tumor.

Water Quality

Poor water quality is the leading cause of koi death. You will have to watch out for the pH, ammonia, nitrite, nitrate and oxygen levels in your pond. Even marginal alterations in their levels can negatively affect koi health. PH pertains to the acid and alkaline levels of your pond. Koi need a pH of 7.0 through 9.0. Ammonia is formed by your koi in the form of waste. It can be removed properly by using biological filter system that takes advantage of the nitrification cycle.

Bacteria will convert ammonia to nitrites. Even so, nitrites are still toxic to the koi and must also be converted by other bacteria into nitrates that are relatively safer to the koi. Nitrates, in turn, are absorbed by the plants and algae in the pond. You already know how oxygen is required to sustain life. As your koi grow in size, they will require more dissolved oxygen. To ensure that there is a lot of oxygen in the pond water set up a waterfall, jets or air pump, or put air stones to add more oxygen into the water.

Parasites, Ulcer Disease and also Bacterial Infections

If the koi fish die or display irregular behavior regardless of the good quality of your water, you could expect the reason to be either parasites or bacterial infections. Parasites such as anchor worms or fish lice can be destructive to your fish. The early signs are red or white pimples that quickly turn into sores. The ulcer can get into the muscles of the fish so you have to discover the disease while still in its early stages.

You will have to keep you koi free from parasites. Keep the infected fish in salted water and feed with medicated food. You can swab the sores with betadine to help them recover. Talk to a veterinarian on how best to cure your koi.

Quarantine

You will have to isolate any brand new fish for three weeks before adding them to the pond. During this period, you will need to treat the fish for parasites. If you don't have a different quarantine tank, be sure to purchase your koi only from trustworthy dealers that guarantees their fish to be parasite-free. Also carefully select the plants for addition to the pond which also needs to be parasite-free.

Overcrowding

If you keep on having koi health problems (like stunted growth or perhaps erratic behavior) despite that your water is of top quality and you bought only parasite-free fish, you may want to evaluate your koi population. Your fish may be experiencing stress as a result of overcrowding.

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