Koi

[flukes]

Are Koi illegal in Sydney?? someone told me that they are illegal in victoria and i want to know why? is it like the carp?
Are koi warm water fish because if they are i cant see a problem with them getting into the water ways.

Cheers
Scott

[Pyroman]

Koi are very much cold-water fish... but I think Kev might have more experience than I about it. :wink:

[flukes]

Yeah ive heard about Kev's Koi addiction!!
I just want to know why they are illegal in victoria and is it australia wide.

[kevkoi]

Australia and their funny laws....
Koi are just coloured carp.

There are state laws which list certain fish as noxious in certain states. Victoria and SA have listed Koi as a noxious species so you are not allowed to keep them.. period. Anyone caught with keeping koi will be slaped with a hefty fine.

Quarantine laws are similar throughout australia. Koi are illegal imports.

Because of the ban on koi importation, Australia has not had a good steady supply of replenishment of new blood into our koi stock. The koi bloodlines that we have in Aust are overly inbred and are about 30years old generally.

While the good Japanese bloodline tategoi (Cream of the crop young koi) can achieve 50cm+ in their first year (and get to 80cm in 3years!), the local koi we get in Australia would be hard pressed to get to 50cm in 10 year!

IMHO, this is not the country to get passionate about keeping koi... :cry: It's heartbreaking.

kev

[Pyroman]

That is really sad... I wonder if there is any petitioning that could be done to relax the restrictions?

[kevkoi]

Yes, pettitioning has been done by the Australian Koi Club for about 20years.... And just about every fish club has had petitions sent to AQIS. BUT, everytime they do a review, another 5 fish species get struck off the list and none get replaced~! At the rate things are going, we're probably all just going to keep Australian Native fish in 30years time. :lol:

Sad... sad place.

[Lily]

what's ironic about it is that the fancy carp are usually so easy for birds to spot they wouldn't last 10 minutes in the waterways - in fact, I always got nervous when I saw pelicans flying overhead near my place - "oh, did I put the bird net back over the pond - don't think so. Argh!". I always expected to come home and have been cleaned out.

Kev, I had no idea that koi that grew so large so quickly even existed! Too bad you can't get them here :(

[kevkoi]

http://www.discusforums.com/forum/album_pic.php?pic_id=50
This picture was taken a year ago... These kois were between 1-2years old, biggest being 3year old Chagoi (Brown koi).

Look at the lower picture at the big boy that's sucking my toe.... look at his head and girth of his body in comparison to my leg! He's 3years old... and 85cm now!

Oh and in this pond withe 30+ koi in Malaysia, I have some large discus swimming down there as well! :wink:

kev

[Proteus]

Kev, everytime I look at that pic it makes me want to have a massive pond... (bit hard on the second floor of an apartment complex)...

I think that it is soooooo kool to have Discus in there as well...

I wonder what my good friend Dino could add to this since he is very well known online and around his parts for his "Outdoor" fish keeping abilities...

Dino, where art thou???

[dinosfishhouse]

Sorry about that folks, life has got in the way of online the last week or so.

Geez, it is kinda scary to think that folks all over the world think about me when big water is mentioned :wink: .

Until the house is up, April, the cattle watering troughs, 2 x 1500 gallons, 7 x 150 gallons, and 6 of the kiddy pools that are outside are mostly plants and a few goldfish and small koi.

Once April gets here, most of the tropicals will move outside for the summer to be moved into the fishhouse in the fall.

One of the kiddy pools that worked out well last year was a koi, black molly, banana plant combo.

I do have the advantage of being able to trade all my grow out koi to the shop I work at/frequent.

Best,
dino