Allotment Gardening Advice Help Chat

Poultry and Pets => Pets without Feathers => Topic started by: mickeyboy on August 24, 2011, 14:42

Title: HELP PLEASE! aclimatising fish
Post by: mickeyboy on August 24, 2011, 14:42
Hi peeps i bought a few little Koi for my pond and a friend told me to make sure i aclimatise them before putting in water!!
Havent got a cle about this any help......
Thanks
Title: Re: HELP PLEASE! aclimatising fish
Post by: joyfull on August 24, 2011, 15:01
Are you supposed to place them in a container with the water they came in in your pond/aquarium so that the water temperature is the same?
Title: Re: HELP PLEASE! aclimatising fish
Post by: tosca100 on August 24, 2011, 15:20
If you float the bag the fish come in in the pond water for about twenty minutes, then gradually add a bit of pond water to the bag, let the fish get used to it for fifteen minutes or so (still leaving the bag in the water) and keep adding more till you have more pond water than original water that should do it. Might seem a faff but better safe than sorry!
Title: Re: HELP PLEASE! aclimatising fish
Post by: 8doubles on August 24, 2011, 17:08
The correct way as above but the carp family are tough and will survive a temperature change with no problems unless they are very small or on their last legs (fins).
Many indoor goldfish lived to a ripe old age being at room temp one minute and in cold tapwater the next on a weekly basis. :)
Title: Re: HELP PLEASE! aclimatising fish
Post by: spottymint on August 28, 2011, 14:00
The correct way as above but the carp family are tough and will survive a temperature change with no problems unless they are very small or on their last legs (fins).
Many indoor goldfish lived to a ripe old age being at room temp one minute and in cold tapwater the next on a weekly basis. :)

In the old day's I would have agreed, but modern Goldfish do not seem as hardy, my tropicals are treated like you say, cold water changes & they liven up a treat, fed every few day's ect.

Blink & the goldfish in the pond are belly up. Just spent a lot of money on new filters, pumps ect & still can't clear the ulcers brought in on  a new fish.

The amount of ropey golfish on sale at certain shops is shocking & yet the one we bought looked healthy, but their stock is now looking like it's at deaths door.
Title: Re: HELP PLEASE! aclimatising fish
Post by: 8doubles on August 28, 2011, 15:24
Most of the water barrels in the garden are used as nurseries for home bred goldfish and despite being swiped at with watering cans and topped up with a hose almost daily they thrive (and get rid of gnat larvae) with virtually zero mortality.
The fish in the ponds will be up swimming in the cold water coming from the hose when i top up, if cold chlorinated water was that 'shocking' would they do that ? :)

As a lad small common carp were wrapped in a piece of wet towel and put in the rucksack for the 4 mile bike ride home from the pond in 70'F+ temperatures then dropped into a bucket of cold Hampshire tap water.
Most (suprisingly) survived.

As for the fish ulcers there was only one cure for any fishy ailment in those days , an hours swim in a bucket of salted cold tapwater. :D








Title: Re: HELP PLEASE! aclimatising fish
Post by: spottymint on August 28, 2011, 18:34
Our home bred goldies seem ok, but for one.

The ghost koi, tench, orf seem unafected at all. It's the new bought one's suffering most .

Seems these days, they breed for maximum output & not quality, you see angel fish with poor fins, clown loach poor colours, goldfish with ulcers, clamped fins, bent spines, shubunkins with poor colours, grass carp with bent spines & orf I have seen with bent spines.

Keep up breeding your own quality stock.
Title: Re: HELP PLEASE! aclimatising fish
Post by: 8doubles on August 29, 2011, 08:53
I wonder about some of the deformed fish , whether it is inbreeding or something else.
I once went on an electro-fishing course held by the local water authority for angling clubs and a lot of the small roach and dace had twisted spines , makes you wonder if the electro fishing of the stream 3-4 times a year was having a bad effect on fry.
I know a percentage of deformed (hunchback) fry is to be expected but the amount of twisted fish coming to the surface was very high.