Need suggestions - Pond koi rehoming

[Nyssa]

Sorry if this belongs in the other section of the forum(feel free to move it if needed), but I'm not sure how to go about this.

Here's a bit of background of the situation: 

So my husband and I are in a bit of a pickle. My FIL just passed away this past weekend, and we're worried about the koi fish in his multi-tiered pond. My MIL most likely is going to have to sell the house since she won't be able to stay there anymore on her own because she is disabled.

My FIL was too sick to do maintenance on the pond the past year or so, and we will most likely need to rehome the fish. We're at a loss on how to even begin that process with everything else going on with funeral arrangements and well... grieving. But it is something that is on our minds for the near future while we start going through things in the house.

There's also a 55 gallon aquarium inside the house with parrot cichlids, and I would imagine we could just bring those to our LFS, but the koi are a big question mark here.

Does anyone here have any suggestions on what we could do or who we could call in this instance? We are in Ocean County in New Jersey. Thanks in advance.

[Fish Folk]

So sorry for your loss.

First thing is to find someone who can responsibly take the Koi. Fortunately, there are some Koi fanatics who probably would love to add these into their setup. Reach out to two local businesses first: (1) Local Fish Stores. Ask for counsel. (2) Local Garden Centers that sell garden pond equipment. Typically they can also counsel you.

Huge Koi can be safely moved over a few hours in large bags + styros in boxes as long as pure O2 and ammonia control is added.

How many Koi are there?

As for the Parrotfish, LFS typically will take them in. FB Marketplace is another possibility.

Here is a quick video showing some Koi being bagged + boxed + O2 added…

 

[PineSong]

I am sorry for your loss; it is a hard time to add in extra tasks like the koi.

Without knowing more about the size and water conditions of the pond and what your FIL's usual maintenance of it looked like, it's hard to know how urgent the situation is--if nobody feeds the koi, will the pond stay stable for a week or a month or longer? My friend inherited a house that had been empty for 2+ years and the fish were fine because nobody was feeding them and the ratio of fish eating naturally occurring bugs/plants to water was sustainable on its own.

In New Jersey, you should have more than a couple options for selling or rehoming the koi--reaching out to a local koi club or koi dealer may lead to assistance. If you enter New Jersey Koi rescue or New Jersey Koi dealers into google or Facebook  you might get good places to start. 

[Nyssa]

On 6/12/2023 at 12:18 PM, Fish Folk said:

So sorry for your loss.

First thing is to find someone who can responsibly take the Koi. Fortunately, there are some Koi fanatics who probably would love to add these into their setup. Reach out to two local businesses first: (1) Local Fish Stores. Ask for counsel. (2) Local Garden Centers that sell garden pond equipment. Typically they can also counsel you.

Huge Koi can be safely moved over a few hours in large bags + styros in boxes as long as pure O2 and ammonia control is added.

How many Koi are there?

As for the Parrotfish, LFS typically will take them in. FB Marketplace is another possibility.

Here is a quick video showing some Koi being bagged + boxed + O2 added…

 

 

On 6/12/2023 at 3:41 PM, PineSong said:

I am sorry for your loss; it is a hard time to add in extra tasks like the koi.

Without knowing more about the size and water conditions of the pond and what your FIL's usual maintenance of it looked like, it's hard to know how urgent the situation is--if nobody feeds the koi, will the pond stay stable for a week or a month or longer? My friend inherited a house that had been empty for 2+ years and the fish were fine because nobody was feeding them and the ratio of fish eating naturally occurring bugs/plants to water was sustainable on its own.

In New Jersey, you should have more than a couple options for selling or rehoming the koi--reaching out to a local koi club or koi dealer may lead to assistance. If you enter New Jersey Koi rescue or New Jersey Koi dealers into google or Facebook  you might get good places to start. 

Thank you, this is really hard but we're pulling through the best we can.

The pump on the upper pond has been broken for a while, so the water hasn't been spilling into the little river and lower pond. I don't think he was well enough to feed them, and I would feed them whenever I was over, so I think the two ponds are their own little ecosystems now. The upper pond has some really big chunky koi, and all of their offspring would go into the spillover river and into the bottom pond.

I need to take a better look at it when I'm over there tomorrow to check on my MIL, I'm not even sure how many there are right now. Last I remember there were maybe 10 or so really big ones, and several babies throughout the system. The river is pretty much dried up from what I can tell, but I'll get a better look.

It was kind of the last thing on everyone's minds to be fair with the circumstances, but I can't help but worry about them 😞 I didn't know there were koi specific clubs, I'll have to do some digging I suppose.

Edited June 12, 2023 by Nyssa

[OxleyT]

Hi Nyssa,

Im so sorry to hear about your FIL. I am actually in New Jersey and currently looking to adopt/rehome some koi. My father had a pond with a bunch of koi that he loved but we had a big heron come by at the end of last summer and devastated it. We have a net over top now and are looking to restart our koi pond. 

Please feel free to message me if you would like to chat!

Edited June 19, 2023 by OxleyT