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Learn the 5 Tricks to Healthy Fish directly from our veterinary staff!
Water Quality
The #1 thing you can do to keep your fish healthy is to have good, clean water. You’ve probably heard this before, but we cannot stress this point enough. Think about how the air you breathe can affect your own health. It’s the same for fish, just underwater.
Regular water testing is a simple step to add to your maintenance routine. You should test pH, ammonia, nitrite, nitrate, alkalinity and temperature regularly. Buy a reliable test kit that uses liquid drops, not strips, for the best results.
Quarantine
Any new fish you bring into your pond has the potential to bring along all of its diseases. In order to protect your established fish, all new additions should be separately quarantined for 4-6 weeks minimum. This will prevent disease spread to your other fish and allow you to treat the new fish specifically. Quarantining will save you time, money and lives. Potentially the lives of all your fish.
Nutrition
Indoor Tanks
Make sure you know what your fish need to be eating! Many specialty foods are available for all types of freshwater and saltwater species. Do your research before purchasing or adopting a new fish and make sure you have their favorite foods at the ready! Read about our how to select the right food for your fish.
Outdoor Ponds
Pick a food for your koi from a reputable company with a good reputation who know their products well. The temperature of the water in your pond will determine what type of food to feed when. Read more about feeding koi here. There are also specialized diets to enhance the color of your koi.
We recommend feeding koi using the 5 Minute Technique. After checking the pond temperature and choosing the appropriate diet, sprinkle a small amount of food and wait for your fish to eat it ALL. Then, sprinkle another small handful and wait for them to eat it all. Continue this for 5 minutes, then stop.
Here are some recommendations:
Cold Weather Diets – 55-65F
Warm Weather Diets – >65F
Recognize Signs of Disease
Since you see your fish every day, you will be the first to notice anything amiss. Maybe one fish doesn’t have the appetite she used to or another who used to be a bully is hanging back at the bottom during feeding time. Sometimes, it’s not the obvious wounds that we get called out for.
Signs of disease can include inappetance, anorexia, lethargy, change in color or behavior. Fish have different personalities that may change upon the addition of new fish to the pond. Stress can cause a lot of problems in koi. Most stress in koi comes from poor water quality!
Read about the most common physical signs of disease and behavioral signs of disease.
Don’t Guess! Ask a Fish Vet
Not all fish owners have direct access to a veterinarian specializing in fish, but not you! Dr. Jessie Sanders, chief veterinarian of Aquatic Veterinary Services, is a certified aquatic veterinarian through the World Aquatic Veterinary Medical Association. Her mobile clinic brings the full veterinary clinic right to you! Our hospital offers in-house appointments, critical care and boarding.
Any questions you have about any aspect of koi care can be answered promptly and correctly. The next time your fish gets sick, don’t just throw a bunch of treatments at it hoping to correct the unknown problem. Call us and we can schedule a consultation or appointment to get to the root of the problem quickly and treat correctly the first time.
Not in our service area? Check out listings for local aquatic veterinarians through the American Association of Fish Veterinarians and the World Aquatic Veterinary Medical Association.
Call now to schedule an appointment or phone consultation!
My wife and I recently got a beta fish, so thanks for sharing this! I like your point about how your fish might change colors if they are sick. We’ll be sure to keep an eye on his scale and eye color so we can catch any diseases early on.