Re-do of the 2016 Spawn -- And now -- results of the 2017 Spawn! Team Ki
This is the long story short report!
1. Bad news/ good news. Bad news first. The F2 who were supposed to be wintering over in the Lower Pond, growing up and preparing for a spawn in 2018 or 2019 were largely wiped out. Unfortunately, mink got into the pond over winter and reduced the population from 14 to 2 survivors, neither of which are spawn material.
2. On May 5, friend and fellow koi kichi, John Clark came over to view the wreckage and brainstorm with me about next moves. We drained the Lower Pond, moved the survivors to a pet pond. We also drained the Big (Ki Shusui Project) Pond and recaptured the F1 oyagoi. We set them aside in a holding pond for the moment.
3. On May 10, 2017, John dusted the Lower Pond with hydrated lime to kill bad bugs and refilled with 150,000 gallons of fresh well water. We inspected the oyagoi and swapped out one female who was aging not so well and substituted her for a gold shusui midori, a sibling of the others from the 2012 spawn.
This girl was fat with eggs and her skin was glowing. Yessss!
Meet a champion in two classes of Koiphen's Virtual Koi Competition; Best Kawarigoi and Best Shusui/Asagi Class 5. She has also won "Most Unique."
Her name: "Unique." 
See the six oyagoi on the left hand side bar
4. The oyagoi, three male, three female, were transferred to the Lower Pond. They were hatched there, grew up there, and previously, they spawned there. They were sooooo happy to be out of nets and into this clean beautiful pond. 
5. Good News!!! The oyagoi spawned on May 15, 2017!!!
See the photo in the heading of this page. Others will follow.
6. On May, 23, 2017 hundreds, maybe thousands of teeny fry were seen and photographed. At two months, July 23, the thousands of fry about this big (!) average 2.5". 
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Below: Sneak peek at the offspring at 2 months old.
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7. In July, August, September to October harvest, the youngsters enjoyed their nursery of 150,000 gallons of well water in a mud pond -- and we enjoyed them! They schooled, made hurricane and fountain patterns, came to dinner as soon as they saw dinner coming to the pond. They were a delight!! Click on the photo - or link here --https://youtu.be/NSA04bAewPk to see VIDEO of the kids at play. ~~ Pictures below: Catching parent fish (oyagoi) from the Big Pond; after draining, liming the nursery pond, then, releasing parents into freshly cleaned and refilled Lower Pond, which is the nursery.
~~ Dramatic spawning and first sight of the new fry. We hit the mother lode. :)
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Fish checking out their pond. Spawning in the reeds at the edges of the pond. Took a full day before all took a rest.
 
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Ki shusui oyagoi sending their DNA down to the next generation. :)
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First picture of just-hatched fry -- put your glasses on!
After the tiny fry, see them at five weeks old. They are thriving on a diet of pond life and freeze-dried plankton. The koi of special interest are the ones with the black dot on their foreheads. This is called "chobo sumi" or small black. This shows shusui/asagi traits. The white ones with yellow markings are showing early signs of becoming ki shusui (!) The yellow/greenish ones with chobo sumi will likely be midori. Gray will likely be asagi.
On July 4, just under six weeks old, the fry were averaging two inches long. Quite good for so young.
Following the photos of the fry at six weeks old, here are some photos of these little charmers in August and September 2017, just up to the age of four months. Prepare yourself to see some very cute young fish. :)
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Here are links to the Youtube videos from the Oct. 2016 Harvest of the Big Pond - also known as the Ki Shusui Project Pond.
It was a really terrific day. The F1 oyagoi who spawned in May looked wonderful so they live to spawn again. The fish in these nets are ki shusui, ki asagi, midori, ayawakaba, doitsu ogon, one hariwake, and muttagoi from the resulting flock spawns.
The videos are pretty short! Enjoy the movies. 
Another tancho ki shusui:
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I hope you enjoyed the photos of our spawn. A lot of babies hatched and thrived. But I'm sorry to say, I do not sell koi -- or anything else! This site is a documentation of my ki shusui breeding efforts and results. You can write to me at kishusui@aol.com. Thanks for stopping by. :wave:
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