As many of you know, we bought a 23 hectares farm to relocate my koi business. Unfortunately, due to certain politics, I decided not to go ahead with this, but has now secured a better farm on the N7, close to Philadelphia, (25 minutes from Cape Town) which I named Nishiki Koi Farm, and the ball is rolling.

Herewith my draft layout, phase 1.



Any ideas will be appreciated.

According to your plan, your koi farm will looks very nice.

But are you planning to act as a koi breeder or a koi dealer?

All koi breeders in my opinion are also koi dealers in a sense.

Initially I am mainly going to import top quality small Koi from the best breeders in Japan and growing it on for sale locally and export to the UK.

However, I will also do some breeding for the lower market and local trade.

If you are planning to breed koi, my suhhestion are:

1) Build the outdoor concrete pond (+- 1m deep) used for raising koi fry near to where you live.

2) And mud pond can be build futher from where you live.

But if you are not so into breed, than you can build mud pond anywhere you want.

To raise fry I believe the best depth is between 60 and 80cm and not in a concrete pond, but a mud pond. The clay is full of minerals and will be supplemented by topsoil/compost/manure for better growth.

If it is deeper, the sun does not reach the bottom and you limit growth of organisms on the bottom being the eventual food. for the fry.

My fry mud dams will only be created during phase 2 with large surface area and not too deep.

The growing on ponds (Phase 1) will be between 1 and 1.5 meters to accommodate all different sizes and to ensure warm water during summer but also deep enough to ensure good body shape.

I need holding/selling ponds and security walling /boundary walls around the homestead. (As indicated on above image.)

That is why I decided to combine the two and to create ponds right around with vibacrete and pond liner inbetween as follows:



Obviously with netting, ... on the corners I will extend the pillars to make provision for the roof/netting, and bottom drains leading to settlement chambers/filters.

To act also as a security wall/boundary wall to keep unwanted elements out and livestock in or out, the pond should be above ground level as much as posible, but the vibacrete will not hold the pressure of the water if it is all above gound level.

My question, how much of the total hight of the pond ( 1 meter plus space above water surface) should be below gound level to ensure that the vibacrete pillars will hold the pressure. I thought of 60 above 50 below.

(Obviously concrete walling/ponds will be much better, but my idea is cheap and can be erected in a day or two. I can always go the concrete route at a later stage.)

Admin,

This is the best compact (small) koi farm that i ever seen...

{MOVED TO ANOTHER CATEGORY}

Nice but out of my league. My major concern is the cost aspect.

I am not too worried about filtration because I will have a constant flow of new Ammonia/Nitrite free water coming in and bio filtration will not be that important. I have got plenty of water and space and will not overstock in these liner ponds. Settlement chambers connected to the bottom drains will be flushed twice a day to get rid of solids with at least a 10% water change everyday.

Rezanne and I are finally moving to the farm the end of this month, so please note, visit only on appointment at my premises in Table View as tenants will occupy it and look after some fish.

One large fry mud pond ready for my anticipated 2008 spawning. (Breeding stock: Chogoro Purachina's)

Still a lot to do to accommodate my current stock (500 +) and newly purchased koi on its way from Japan(430) and 300 in my mud dam in Wellington.

Still very accesable to clients, 15 minutes from Table View on the N7.

Our initial accommodation is very small:



but at least the land can accommodate numerous mud dams and I will spend most of my time at the dams.



Accommodation for the koi comes first again. The liner ponds as descibed above are in progress and then meters and meters of netting to keep the Herons (who currently occupy the land) out.

I am like a small child who can not wait for Christmas.

Congratulations!

Map: