Care For Your Koi And Koi Pond During Winter Season

You will not have to spend so much time looking after your Koi pond during the winter months because nothing much will be happening during this time. On the other hand, it does not mean that you should neglect the maintenance of your pond. You have to take necessary actions to make sure that the plants as well as your fish in the Koi pond will survive the winter season.

Given below are some of the points that you should remember while caring for your Koi and pond during the cold months:

1. Do not feed your fish- The average time taken by the Koi to digest the food that it has eaten is about four days. It is suggested that you feed your Koi once a day only, during the winter season. You will not have to feed your fish at all if the coldness becomes less than minus fifty degrees. If you continue to feed your fish then it can harm your Koi and it can even kill the fish. Just because the fish has opened its mouth does not mean that it is hungry for food, it is the learned reflex of Koi. The Koi can also eat and digest other things inside the pond, aside from the food that you are feeding the fish.

2. Cleaning the Koi pond- Cleaning the pond of your Koi can take as long as one week and while you are cleaning it, you have to ensure that you get rid of all the pollutants or unwanted matters inside the pond. Remove all the leaves, silt and other matters that are lying on the bottom of the Koi pond. You should also pull out those plants from the pond that will not be able to survive the winter season. Furthermore, you should also get rid of those matters lying near the pond so that they can not be blown into your pond. This way you can prevent bacteria and parasites from growing inside the pond.

3. Yearly check up- You should perform an annual check up of all the equipments or objects such as the filtration system, bags, nets, medications, water testing kits, etc.

You should always be prepared before hand so that you will be ready to face the winter season before it sets in. You can also consider buying a heater for your pond so that your Koi can survive the winter season. Just make sure that the heater you buy can give out the amount of heat as required by the Koi pond. If it can not offer sufficient heat to the pond then ice will start to form in the pond and this will harm your fish.

When you plan for the winter season in advance, you will be doing your fish a great favor as you will be helping your Koi survive the winter season.