Our 12^th annual imported fish sale & Spring Seminars was enjoyed by large crowds of pond, koi and Gold Fish lovers. We had very nice comfortable weather on both Saturday and Sunday. Mr. Yoshida was accompanied this year by Mr Yohei Nagasaki a koi breeder from Toyoto City, Japan. Yohei Koi Farms is already famous for breeding unique top quality Hybrid Gosanke, Yambuki, and Goshiki. Yohei Hybrid koi are highly sought after and have won top awards in shows all over Japan.

Yohei-san was a fun guest and very interested in koi keeping/keepers in Texas. He gave us a very informative live hands on seminar about his hybrid koi and was very interested in helping us to select our koi purchases. He spoke in great length (with Mr. Yoshida’s translation assistance) on how to select baby koi based on overall quality. His emphasis was largely on body structure and hi quality. His koi seminars focused on his developing a new bloodline of “hybrid” koi with the foundation being a unique white wild born carp that grew to over 39 inches.  

"Monster" was the name given to the wild born Shiro Magoi                                female crossed to Kohaku males that have led to Yohei Hybrid Koi

From the 1^st generation cross mostly only white koi were produced along with a few shiro bekkos. The shiro bekkos were crossed with sankes to produce 3^rd generation hybrid sankes. Likewise the 2^nd generation white koi were crossed to produce kohaku, showa, goshiki and also yamabuki ogon using high quality koi parents of the type wanted.

The goal was to produce faster growing and stronger/healthier “hybrid” koi from these crosses. The baby hybrid koi he brought to our event to sell clearly demonstrates his success to date. His Tosai koi can reach 20 inches and his two year old koi can reach 29 inches. Other breeders have bred wild carp into their bloodlines but their percentage of jumbo (over 30 in koi as a total of their production is less than 10% where his percentage of jumbo koi is about 50%. Yohei-san has been able to produce high quality koi within 3-4 generations containing about 25% wild carp genes as a result. Other breeders starting with a ordinary black carp as a parent koi have had to wait until 5-6 generations and have used more ordinary koi as parents resulting in only 2-3% wild carp genes remaining in their hybrid koi production.

To see some photo's of Yohei Hybrid koi CLICK HERE

Mr. Megumi Yoshida has been in the koi business in Tokyo, Japan for over 30 years. He is a 3rd generation koi dealer/breeder and a Director of the Japanese Koi Dealer Association. Mr.Yoshida has supplied Grand Champion koi to hobbyists all over the world. He has special relationships with many of the top koi breeders in Japan. This was his 12^th appearance at our annual fish sales with our club. His ability to put on high quality seminars and translate into English the comments of his guest breeders makes for a very special event.

Here is the listing of the super Raffle lucky winners: Hybrid Kohaku donated by Yohei Koi farms and won by Stacy Bass. Gin Rin Kujaku donated by Megumi Yoshida was won by Ralph & Diane Bates. $50 worth of Goldfish donated each day by Mike Christensen  won by Diane Bates. and Bill Bohnas. $50 worth of Longfin koi donated each day by Vance Schultze  won by Carlos Hernandez and Dan Machachek. Hand Made Koi Vase by Bonita Wulf won by Diane Bates. Book – “Advanced Koi Diagnosis & Treatments by Duncan Griffiths donated by Duncan Griffiths won by Ralph Bates. Two(2) ScareCrow animal chasers donated by Contech won by P. Finch & Sabrina Mejhan. Large bag of Mazuri koi food donated by Mazuri won by Bonnie Turner. We also want to thank all of the donators and supporters of our $1 raffle. Donations received from: Tetra, Hai-Feng, Aqua UV, TKFGS members, Water Garen Gems, Mr. Yoshida, Andrews koi international, Current USA, Ani-Mate, Danner, Ecological Labs, Crystal Clear Fish food, Mazuri Koi Food, Hikari,  Jungle Laboratories, Koi USA and Wardleys.        

Mr. Yoshida’s Growing Contest Mr Yoshida sponsors a growing contest each year. Anyone buying a $100 koi can have it registered, photographed, and measured and entered into the next years growing contest free. The following year the koi are measured and photographed by the owners and the photos brought back to be judged for finish, growth, and future potential. Here are the results from this years contest. Special thanks to the owners of the 10 koi grown photographed and entered this year. Every owner returning a koi photograph was given a award. We all enjoyed learning how they have changed and grown from last year.                             

2004-2005 Growing Contest Results

Here are photos and descriptions of the top three award winners along with their baby picture from last year.

GRAND CHAMPION:Special congratulations to Carsten Pederden who won Grand Champion with a Yohei Hybrid Sanke that was 13-1/4 inches last year and was measured at 19-1/2 inches this year – Grew 6-1/4 inches.  

Ralph Bates won Best Tategoi with this Sakuma Sanke which was 7-3/4 inches last April and grew to 14-1/4 inches by this April growing 6-3/4 inches.

BEST GROWTH: Ray Jordan selected and grew this Maruyama Kohaku last year it measured 8-1/2 inches. This year it measured 17 inches for a total growth of 8-1/2 inches in one year. Notice the left eye is protruding in this years photo. This fault kept it from getting Grand Champion. It is possible the eye protrusion might resolve by itself or it might not.

Volunteers We could not possibly have this quality of event without a bunch of generous volunteers helping to set up everything, run the various events and raffle table and then tear everything down and put it away afterwards. Special Thanks to the following special people (from San Antonio unless noted). Eddie Elizondo, Ralph & Diane Bates, Tommy & Billie  Emanuel (Groves) Mac McGreevy (Port Aurthur), Tom & Jennifer Walker (Frisco),Tom Ayers (Tucson), Kathii & Barry Tackett) J.R. & Sue Hensley (New Braunfels), Sherry & Paul Kriner (New Braunfels) Bruce & Ramona Flanders, Ray & Martha Jordan, Sandra & Gary Laird, Carsten Pederson, Jean Waldschmidth (Wemberly), Lee & Larry White(Freer), Darryl and Jackie Welch (Oklahoma), Raymond & Jenny Longstreth, Burt & Sally Nichols (Marion).

Very Special Thanks to Martha (Mimi) not only for all she did for our event but also for letting me play with koi as much as I do.

Very, Very, Very special thanks to those wonderful volunteers (Martha, J.R. & Sue, Barry, Gary, Paul, Bruce & Ramona) that dragged themselves back to the site on Monday morning to wash sort and put away all our equipment so it will be clean &  ready for our show the end of  September. With so many volunteers I sure hope I didn’t forget anyone.

Also extra special THANKS to all the fine folks at Water Garden Gems. Not only does Water Garden Gems provide a location for our events but they also donate a large portion of our raffle items and coordinate all the activities with the seminars and other necessities involved in having a successful event. We are already starting to plan for next year’s 13^th annual spring fish sale and seminars which will most likely be the last weekend in March or the 1^st weekend in April 2007. Special Guest Breeder to be announced. Hope to see everyone again next year! Details of 2007 event will be posted on our website later this year at www.texaskoi.com