Koi Club of San Diego

Volume 25 Issue 05

KOI CLUB OF SAN DIEGO

NEWSLETTER

May 2025

PRESIDENT'S MESSAGE

by Matt Rhoades

Board of Directors Candidate Solicitation

The club is looking for people to serve on the KCSD Board of Directors for the upcoming year that starts in July. Your leadership and vision are crucial to the continued success and growth of our organization.

The Board of Directors plays a vital role in guiding our club’s direction, ensuring fiscal responsibility, and advancing our mission. We are seeking dedicated individuals who are passionate about our cause and committed to making a positive impact.

Please submit your name, before May 18th, to lpluth@cox.net.

The positions open on the board are:

• Vice President of Venue (Looking for and asking members to host).
• Vice President of Programs (Creating and asking people to talk on Koi topics).
• Secretary

Thank you for your interest in serving on the KCSD board in a leadership position. Your dedication and expertise will help us achieve our goals and make a lasting difference. We look forward to welcoming new and visionary members to our Board of Directors.

The April Meeting

The meeting at the house of Dean Strasser was well attended and interesting questions were raised/discussed. How to introduce new fish and quarantine practices were the Pond 101 topics this month.  There were many tips/ tricks mentioned and discussed. I also demonstrated my how-to practices using my Thermometer fish. A big thank you goes out to the great host and storyteller, Dean.

This Months Koi 101 Topic

The Pond 101 topic for the month of May will be: Friendly Koi can happen in any pond. We’ll talk about which koi make for positive encounters at the pond edge. The most popular koi extroverts are….  Stay tuned.

If you have a topic for a future Pond 101 month or a question that could lead to a topic;, please send topics and/or questions to me at: matrhoa@gmail.com.

May General Meeting

The May meeting will be on the following Sunday because of Mother’s Day. It will be on Sunday the 18th at the home of Jill and Rick Leach in Lemon Grove. I’m looking forward to seeing a new pond that I haven’t been to; always exciting. As always, a pot-luck meal will be going on; so, bring what you would like to share. Of course, drinks and water will be provided.

Please don’t forget to bring a chair.

Until then,

.  Matt - Koi Kichi to the end.

Koi Club of San Diego Meeting

May 18th, 2025 

STEERING COMMITTEE MEETING

Wednesday, May 14th

at 7:00 pm (earlier if you are ordering food)

ALL MEMBERS ARE WELCOME!

Dennys

2691 Navajo Road

El Cajon, CA 92020 

Koi Club of San Diego Ponder Profile

by Lenore Wade, photography by Rick Leach

Rick and Jill Leach

As I was preparing to write this article, I asked Rick where his house was. (I knew the general area.) I was taken aback when he said, “Look for the boat in the front yard!” The 25-year-old Blackman is his pride and joy.

They live in an older section of Lemon Grove where many of the houses are like small cottages; cute and quaint on large green-filled lots. It has been their home for close to 28 years.

Rick was born and raised in the Golden Hills area of San Diego. He has rarely left here except to go to L.A. where his uncle trained him in the art of being a stone-mason. It is a profession he loves and takes great pride in. Just seeing all of the changes he has made in their house is a testament to that. Although he considers himself semi-retired, he keeps himself busy doing special jobs.

Jill grew up all over as the daughter of a father who made the Air Force his career. She spent much of her growing up years in the Bay area and finally moving to San Diego in 1986. She had a number of “office jobs”, but was never really happy until she went to school and became a Horticulturist. She enjoys being outside working with all types of plants. She has worked at the San Diego Zoo for almost 18 years. Her official job title is “Area Gardener”. Next time you go to the zoo, look for her in and around the polar bear exhibit.

They began working on their pond about 2010 when they had one single koi. They wanted more. The pond, which is about 6x8 foot in size, 4 feet deep, holds about 1400 gallons, and has two-levels. The upper one is home to “Skim” a decent sized turtle that came from the zoo as a very small creature 13 years ago. The lower pond has some beautiful fish, which their dog Chica keeps check on.

The pond sits just outside their living area a few steps down from the porch that runs across the top. Here, “B” the other little dog sits and watches. The cat, Kitty, could care less about any of it!

The yard is mesmerizing with a great number of large trees and plants that are free to just exist. Rick is very proud of his epiphyllums which were in gorgeous pink display when I was there. Don’t forget to look for the very unique vertical waterfall that the birds love.

In 2020, knowing the pond needed some help, they went to the Koi Show looking for answers. At that time, they were very fortunate to meet “our Dean” and the rest is history. They learned better ways to do the things that made their koi happier and the pond more efficient.

The yard has 2 gates, so it will be easy to access the back yard for the meeting. There will be 2 canopies to shade you in case you aren’t under a tree. So, remember to bring your chairs and a food dish to share on May 18^th. Yes, that is a week later than usual so you can spend time with someone special on Mother’s Day.

WELCOME NEW MEMBERS!

Mark Jenkins and Pamela Connor

WELCOME BACK RENEWING MEMBERS!

KHA KORNER

by "Koi Jack" Chapman

KHA Korner – Competitive Exclusion and Aeromonas Alley

At yesterday’s club meeting concerning adding new koi to your pond the conversation led to a discussion of competitive exclusion products, and I had a few questions after the meeting on the subject.  So, when I got home, I looked at my files and had written articles on the subject in 2016 and 2021 - so guess what got updated for this month’s article, and I apologize for it not being done a month or two earlier.  

Yes, it’s now (past) time to think about spring and your pond and there are several subjects that come to mind and competitive exclusion is just one for consideration.  If you have too many koi in your pond and in past springs have experienced issues with sick koi and/or skin and fin infections then Aeromonas and Pseudomonas (A&P) are more than likely the pathogenic organism behind your problems. I’ve done parasite articles in the past and this article’s purpose is to center on A&P and some ways to deal with it to include competitive exclusion.

As background from past article:  “One of the things you need to be mindful of is the range of temperatures in which your koi are most vulnerable to what triggers bacterial infections (most often A&P) and WHY it’s happening.  Think pond temp and what’s going on in my bio-filter and my koi’s immune system.  Yes, it’s a combination of factors.  First aeromonas bacteria is inactive at 39F and starts to become active at 40F – with each degree to 60F (max) it becomes exponentially more active as in reproduction.  While at the same time, our koi only start to improve their immune system after 55F.  For the science nerd in us all, this is measured by the presence of white blood cells (WBC) in a blood sample and there is a reported case study in the literature that showed zero WBC in some koi at 55F.  So between 40F and 55F, we got the bad bugs multiplying while the koi’s immune system is close to nonexistent.  Before you get upset – this is one of Mother Nature’s ways to weed out the weakest for the survival of the species.  (Ref: MN rule book page 3) LOL.  The temperature zone of most vulnerability to Aeromonas infections is 47F to 62/63F – what we like to call Aeromonas Alley.  Seventy-seven or 78F is generally accepted and been reported as the optimum temperature for koi metabolic efficiency - as well as the temp at which their immune system will be close to if not at max.  It is believed that the koi’s immune system is at about 25% efficiency when they emerge from Aeromonas Alley (62/63F), and attain 50% around 70F.  Now at the same time, the bacteria in your bio-filter is becoming more active to handle the pond nitrogenous waste that will increase with feeding, decomposing organic matter and increased koi activity.  Nitrosomonas activity, which converts ammonia NH3 to nitrites NO2, is reported to be at or close to zero at 40F and will reach 50% capacity at 60F and at 100% efficiency at 75F.  At the same time Nitrobacter bacteria converts NO2 to nitrates NO3 (to complete the nitrogen cycle) but at a slower pace is reported as not active till 60F but also reaching full activity at 75F.   A word of caution for us in southern California -- with us not having to deal with real winter conditions, aeromonas will most likely continue to populate (be active) in our ponds during the typical winter months (especially this past winter) and if you start to feed your koi too early and too high in protein – it will exit your koi as undigested fish poop – OTHERWISE known as the best food possible for the bad bacteria at the worst time!!!  Yes – as I like to say POOP WATCH TIME.”

With the above in mind, what can you do to reduce the risk of A&P infections this spring? 

• 1.     Don’t overfeed or overstock and start with reduced protein food in spring.
• 2.     Keep up with your water maintenance - Big Time – especially with eliminating detritus (decomposing organic compounds DOC in your pond and filter system), and water changes.  As I like to say “The solution to pollution is dilution.”  Want to reduce the food source for the A&P.
• 3.     Make sure your oxygen levels are good and consider raising them.  The energy the koi saves acquiring oxygen they use for other body requirements to include immune responses.
• 4.     Consider adding salt to your pond (up to 0.3%) to increase the slime coat on your koi as a defense against infections during early spring.
• 5.     While not practical for most of us, you could heat your pond and thereby reduce the length of time your pond is in the temp range for A&P Alley and getting the koi’s immune system up to speed quicker.  Good luck with that – it’s costing me about $200 to $250 a month to keep my 300 gallon outside Q-tank at 76.1F and yes I cover it at night.
• 6.     Keep a close eye on your koi during spring – look at each koi for signs of illness.  When you feed them look at lower lip for mouth rot.  Keep an eye on fins of any koi who spends time sitting on the bottom and don’t forget the anal fin.  
• 7.     Quarantine new koi as they could bring new species of A&P to your pond that your koi have not been exposed to and result in illness to your koi collection during this time when their immune system is not up to par.  Yes, some species of A&P are more virulent (disease causing) than others.
• 8.     Chemical additives to reduce A&P include Potassium Permanganate, Formalin, Malachite, Chloramine T, UV, Ozone, and lastly antibiotics for active disease.  Several of the above can also kill your koi – BIG CAUTION.
• 9.     You can look at the available information and consider adding one of the several popular Sludge Busters like Microbe-Lift-PL to your pond to shorten the life of existing DOC (nutrients for A&P).
• 10.                        Non Chemical - you could consider adding a competitive exclusion product to your pond to reduce the populations of A&P.  You will never get rid of all the A&P in your pond, but you do want your pond pathogenic bacteria colony count down below the disease causing level which is different for each koi.  NO – the koi that got sick last year will not (almost never) be the first to get sick this year especially if dealing with the same strain of A&P.   

So just what is competitive exclusion (CE)?  I’m going to opt for the simple short explanation – in Mother Nature everything is a competition.  To quote Tom Lansing “Competition coefficients quantify the magnitude of the competitive effect of one species on another.” The general idea to use a non-pathogen organism to reduce or eradicate a pathogenic organism is not new.  We are talking about bacteria in this case so we want a non-pathogenic bacteria that when added to our pond will compete with the A&P for the exact same nutrition requirements found in any pond.  By denying the A&P of required nutrients they die and their reduced numbers will hopefully eliminate infections in your koi population.  There are several products out there that you can use and I’ve seen scientific studies to substantiate the reduction of A&P colonies to very low numbers below any suggested disease level.  I’ve had experience with using both (not at the same time) KoiZyme and Microbe-Lift PL and there are now dry products for the same thing.  Of late, Aqua Meds as added Aqua Medzyme with a 5-dose regiment worth a look.  The livestock community has used CE products for years and these are most associated with the word Probiotics.  Some of the more popular koi foods of today are now incorporating probiotics in the feed formula.  For those of you like me – you might want to have a colony count done on your pond water for A&P (but I do only A) before using a CE product and again in say 30 and 60 days as there is a week dosage after the initial dose.  I do believe this is the best non-chemical treatment to reduce A&P when done in connection with some of the other items listed earlier.  This is not a substitute for following the standard water quality parameters and practices!!   As a matter of fact, when following the standard practices and policies of GOOD koi husbandry, added CE products, besides those found in koi feed, should not be needed.  If any of you choose to try this non-chemical treatment to reduce A&P in your pond this spring I would normally start about mid- March.  As always I’ve just scratched the surface of this subject and additional research on your part is encouraged.  I hope you have a disease-free spring – you and your koi.

PLEASE VISIT OUR APPAREL SHOP!

THANK YOU JAMIE KANES FOR YOUR BEAUTIFUL DESIGNS!

Koi Person of The Year 2025 Jill Rhoades

OFFICERS

EMAIL

President: Matt Rhoades   

KCSDKoi.Kichi@gmail.com

First VP-Program: Cory Burke

Mulligrins@gmail.com

Second VP-Venue: Ben Adams

iblitlrock5@yahoo.com

Secretary: Open

Treasurer: Jill Rhoades

treasurer.kcsd@gmail.com

APPOINTED OFFICERS

EMAIL

Newsletter editor/

Webmaster: Julia Schriber

webmaster.kcsd@gmail.com

Membership Chairman: Jill Leach

Koi Health Advisor/

Librarian: Jack Chapman

jackchapman1@cox.net

Club Historian: Dr. Galen Hansen

galenkoi@aol.com

Property Manager: Al Pierce

alpierce@cox.net

Correspondence Secretary: Shirley Elswick

 sfelswick@cox.net

Japanese Friendship Garden Liaison: Linda Pluth

 lpluth@cox.net

HELPING HANDS

Koi Health Advisor/

Water Quality: Jack Chapman

jackchapman1@cox.net

To Host a Meeting: Ben Adams

iblitlrock5@yahoo.com

To Submit an Article: Linda Pluth

 lpluth@cox.net

Program/Activities Suggestions: Cory Burke

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