Selling fish is not so simple as placing them in a body of water and scooping them out as folks pick out their favorite ones. A lot of time and effort goes into designing and building holding tanks and maintaining water quality.
Fish go through an enormous amount of stress before they reach the retailer. Unlike fish growers, importers and wholesalers as a rule do not have massive facilities to hold their fish. They deal with very large quantities and it’s basically fish in / fish out. One told me he holds his fish for a week and another told me that he has too much money tied up and can’t sit on them, needing to recover his investment right away. Some of their facilities are nice but some are less than desirable. These overcrowded conditions set the stage for problems at the retail center as well as problems after they have been sold to the customer and taken home.
Unfortunately many of the fish shipped to the retailer from the breeder will be infested with parasites. Parasites bring on bacterial infection. Both are contagious. Imported koi, more so than domestic, are especially prone to breaking down with bacterial infections weeks after we receive them. This is partially due to disease problems overseas plus the horrendous stress involved with shipping them here.
Stress factors exist at the retail level and the stress doesn’t end until they are sold and taken home to a pond with stable, good water quality. Most all retailers receive their fish by air. They are then floated then released into tanks very much like it is done in your pond. Some retailers, just like the wholesalers and importers, sell their fish immediately without a treatment or a quarantine period. They do this for an economical reason - besides the fact that most do not have the facilities to separate and quarantine the shipments - holding and treating the fish adds cost. These costs include water, chemicals, salt, etc. PLUS many fish die while undergoing the quarantine process. On the average, during quarantine, we lose 15% of our domestic goldfish and koi and 35% of our imported fish!
Fish health should be the most important issue to a retailer of koi and goldfish. Overcrowded tank conditions, fluctuations in water parameters and predators present complex problems that can literally send an investment of fish stock down the tubes. Stress is a killer and makes it harder for a fish to fight off disease. Ammonia, nitrites, pH all contribute to stress factors. Netting a single fish will stress out the whole batch.
It’s not an easy task to create and maintain the type of environment where thousands of fish can be displayed and sold with the least amount of stress factors present. When we were selling fish in Alpharetta, our tanks were set up so that they were not on the same filtration system. This allowed us to quarantine and separately treat any questionable batch of fish. We tested the water parameters of each tank every day and performed parasite treatments on all new batches. When new fish arrived they were placed in quarantine for a minimum of 2 weeks. During this time they were treated for parasitic infestation and bacterial infection. Only after the quarantine period of 2 weeks and a check to make sure everything was okay would we sell a fish.
It’s a shame that all in the industry do not perform these types of preventative tasks.
Ticking Bombs
When a retail establishment does not practice healthy fish salesmanship he sets the consumer up so that he may be taking home a ticking bomb that will infect the rest of his pond. There are things to look for whenever you purchase fish.
Never buy:
a fish with an ulcer
a fish whose fins are rotting away
one with red blood streaks in his fins
one that has no spirit or is listless
a fish with sunken eyes
one that is sitting on the bottom with clamped fins
These are all indications of something worse.
Beware of Koi Show Purchases
It’s the end of the season and some of you may be attending a koi show soon. A koi show is a great place to see beautiful extremely high-quality koi both imported and domestic. Folks bring their personal koi in to be judged against others of the same variety. The one that is chosen as Grand Champion is, no doubt, a sight worth seeing!
People in the pond business, like us, might attend a show to re-establish old contacts and meet new ones. It’s a way to see new products and keep a pulse on what’s going on. At Koi America, the show we attended in Chantilly, Virginia, the Doc had a chance to go over a few things with a few of our vendors. I snapped this picture of the Doc talking with Steve at Emperor Aquatics. That is one way we communicate our customers’ wishes with our vendors.
There are always plenty of vendors selling koi at koi shows. We have in the past considered getting booths at local koi show but almost always decided, instead, to sell them from the store where we could control their environment. Perhaps while we're in between locations and not able to carry fish we might consider it again but it has its problems.
Koi do not travel well. They lose their immunity to disease for 72 hours and during travel their stress levels are at an all-time high. We know of a time or two when fish were shipped to a show directly from Japan. The most profit is made when fish are sold before the weaker ones die off. We prefer to take the hit instead of our customer who is buying a pet — not just a fish. We do not want to subject our fish to another move that will weaken them. There is enough loss of life due to shipping stress as it is.
To make matters worse, many of the fish have parasites.
Traditionally vendors hold fish at shows in small, over-crowded tanks with no filtration for a period of at least 3 days. Unless proper water changes are performed ammonia and nitrite levels become another stress factor to further deteriorate the health of the fish.
Every time a net is lowered into the water it adds to the level of stress the fish are enduring. This is done non-stop during a koi show and less often at a good retail center.
The mortality rate of fish sold at koi shows is extremely high! The stress, water conditions, handling of the fish — it all contributes to that high percentage that do not make it past the first week or two after being taken home. Some vendors rely only on koi shows as their way of selling koi and goldfish. They are here today — gone tomorrow.
We must confess that in 1999 we set up tanks at the Atlanta Koi Show and brought in some of the prettiest high-quality butterflies we’ve ever had available. It was an easy way to sell a lot of fish and turn a quick profit — or so we thought. Although we knew the problems associated with show fish sales the lure of the all-mighty dollar made us lose our good sense. This came back to haunt us. A few weeks after the show customers began calling with the bad news of about 40% mortality! This took us by surprise because we are not accustomed to our customers losing fish purchased through us. Of course we made them good but we feel it damaged our reputation and our reputation is something in which we take great pride! So when the lure of the mighty dollar called us again the following year — especially since we had all those beautiful hand-selected koi to sell — we regained our senses and thought better of it.
In a nutshell, the environment and circumstances koi must endure during a show are harsh. As a consumer I’d think twice about purchasing a fish from a show, no matter how pretty it is, and I certainly wouldn’t wait until the last day of the show. This is when the fish have been marked down. By then noticeable signs of stress often appear. These include clamped fins, listlessness, hovering at the top of the water, gasping for air -- you name it, we’ve seen it! Koi shows are best enjoyed when there’s no bad taste left in your mouth over losing an expensive fish. Try to resist those end-of-the-show special prices because a deal is not a deal if the fish dies.
No Matter Where They Come From…...Quarantine Them!
Even if you purchase fish from the most reputable dealer in town — even if you buy from us — do yourself and your pond’s inhabitants a favor and QUARANTINE your fish before you put them into your pond. The #1 cause of parasitic infestation is the introduction of new fish without a period of quarantine and treatment. Prevention is the best cure – and the lease expensive – and the easiest!
Here’s how to quarantine:
First, it’s great to know if and what type of parasite is present on the fish. If you have the opportunity, have several mucus scrapings done by a vet. This is the preferred method. The other method is called "shot-gunning". This means taking for granted that the fish have parasites. Go ahead and treat your fish. Our Parasite Pak makes that easy.
Don’t feed the fish for the first 2 days. Feeding is stressful. Monitor your water quality in the quarantine tank. Be aware of ammonia increases and buffer the water to guard against pH fluctuations.
The quarantine period should be no less than 14 days. If you see no problems developing and you feel comfortable about the health of your new fish then feel free to introduce him to his new home.
Industry ResponsibilityWe believe it should be our responsibility as koi and goldfish retailers to clean up the stock before it gets sold to the customer. Unfortunately only a few of us practice this healthy fish salesmanship. The industry seems happy with status quo. We’re not — and, as consumers, you should not be happy with it either. You can help us change the attitude by not supporting the retailers who do not quarantine and treat their fish. We’ve never been popular among our peers because we speak out for the health of the fish. But, then again, we’re not here to win popularity contests. We’re here to sell healthy koi and goldfish.
Update: Summer 2009
Due to popular demand we are once again selling koi and goldfish. We finally got our new holding and quarantine facilities up and running. Now you can come by and pick out nice, clean, healthy koi (pre-quarantined!) or goldfish in Dahlonega or have a few shipped to you if you are in the Continental US. Just Call Cecil at (404) 375-9599 or Click HERE to view the ones we have put online.
From the Pond-A-Thon Edition of What's Up, Doc?, July / Aug / Sept 2001 / © 2001, PondDoc.com. Revised Sept. 2007. All rights Reserved. Reproduction of this article prohibited without prior consent of The Pond Doc.
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