Koi Quarantine Proccess
On The Day of Arrival
Koi are placed in the required quarantine tank or pond at a temperature of 15-18 degrees depending on the time of year as travelling temperatures can change. Bags are floated for around 40 mins to acclimatise to the required water temperature of the water in the bag. We then slowly add some water from the quarantine pond to the bag before placing the Koi into a bowl for inspection.
We never allow the water from the bag to get into our system due to the high levels of ammonia that may be present in the bag from traveling, this then allows us to have a very quick inspection of the Koi. At this stage a number of skin scrapes will be performed to test for parasites and inspected under the microscope.
Koi are always placed into 0.65% of salt in all our quarantine tanks and this is done for all Koi arriving from Japan. This can help with stress and with a number of parasites that maybe on the Koi when they arrive in the UK.
Oxygen levels are placed as high as possible at this point and we also tend to add Evolution Aqua PURE+ Filter Start Gel to our filter system which helps with the high levels of Koi that have arrived and sudden change in ammonia Nitrite and Nitrates. At this point we make sure the pond is covered or netted and we spend some time checking the slides to see if we can find any parasites.
Day 2
We do spend a little time to have a good look over the Koi to make sure they have all settled in well and there has been no damage over night as they have a tendency to jump around the night of shipment. We ensure a good inspection of each koi in the bowl and if no parasites were found on the slides the night before we will will take further samples from the Koi just to ensure nothing has been missed, we often check 60% to 70% of them at one go.
If at this stage we find any parasites we will treat with the required treatment and redose with the required time. Depending on the amount we find will depend on treatments we use and how many minimum of 2 required.
At this stage the temperature will be set at 18 degrees if not already and this is when we will add the required parasite treatment.
Continuation Plan
Day 3 we will do our first heat vamp which we will at this point bring the temperature up to 26 degrees, this is the most important part of quarantining which helps to bring out many different things. The most important is KHV, by raising the temps to 26 degrees this brings out any virus which allows us to deal with it swiftly and prevent this entering your pond. This does require 2-3 heat vamps and a cool down period also to give the best chance for the virus to show itself.
We do our heat vamping 2-3 times over our 6 week quarantine period sometimes up to 8 weeks and also keep the temperature at the required rate 26c for a 14 day period we believe this allows the best chance for any viruses or diseases to surface and for us to deal with in a quick and efficient manner. Also during this time we do drop the temp to 12c for 24 hrs before our next heat vamp which can also help to bring out the diseases like KHV. During this time we will carry on testing various skin scrapes on random Koi to assure that all Koi are clear of parasites as the best we possibly can.
We do take our quarantine very seriously at Northants Koi and take every possible steps we can to assure the Koi can be taken home the best possible health they can be.
Our Koi are quarantined in a separate building away from the sales ponds to assure that no cross contamination can take place. Also ponds and QT tanks are run on their own filter systems and no nets or bowls are shared in any way between ponds. No breeders are mixed until quarantine is complete and moved to our sales ponds.
After the 6-8 weeks of quarantine and everything is at the highest of standards we will move the Koi outside to one of the sales pond ready to be sold to the public.