I’m sure you may all remember the last August bank holiday of 2001, the Saturday was a really nice day and Sunday was pouring it down, just typical of the UK Bank Holidays. Well, for myself I shall remember it for a different reason, as you will read on, that Sunday I lost virtually all my beautiful Koi collection, probably my own fault, or was it just a tragic set of circumstances!!!

It all began with the usual weekly filter cleaning routine that I have performed hundreds of times, virtually every weekend, so nothing different there, but due to one reason or another I did not have the usual water supply trickling through the purifier (which would have normally filled the system up to the overflow), as this water supply is connected to our outside tap used for the gardening water hose and we were using it for the garden. We were working in the garden all that Saturday; we were outside to quite late, at least 10:30pm

I had shut off the power so I could perform the routine filter maintenance (about 2:30pm), which starts with the second chamber filter brushes being removed, shaken out and dipped in the vortex water to clean away any lose debris, then flushing each filter chamber and the vortex in turn, of course replacing the lost water (approx 10-15%) depending how dirty the system has become over the weeks feeding.

I should point out that ever since we moved house back in July 1994, I have kept my 19(20) Koi in what could be described as a quarantine type facilities (temporary, permanent) the latest version holding a little over 850 gallons, plus the contents of the Clover Leaf (iii) filter system. When I initially filled the system it measured 965 gallons +/- 10 Gallons for overflow height.

I had deliberately overfilled the system again as normal, this seems to be a good way of ridding the protein scum from the surface water, again something that I have done occasionally, such that the water cascaded over the front of the tank, which is where I think may have caused the problem!!!!! This is where I have the power supply outlet distribution situated in this position; this is well covered with a butyl rubber cover, to prevent any water splashing on the 240V supply (and hence may have tripped out the supply breaker).

This of course is protected via an earth leakage circuit breaker (ELCB) inside the garage. You may of guessed by now what I’m about to write!!!!, Yes, the power supply was shut off via the ELCB at some point in time after I had performed the maintenance or during the night due to the ELCB tripping out for some reason!!!!! I had checked the system prior to closing up the filters, as I have always done, then checked that all was correct and running an hour or so later, so the last time that I actually went into the quarantine area was about 4:30pm.

That night here was also some very heavy thunderstorm activity, some very close by lightning strikes; our house has been struck before!!! This also could have been and was probably the cause!!!! This is a little ironic, as part of my work is looking after the protection of civil and military aircraft against lightning strikes!!!!

The ELCB has only ever tripped out once before, this was due to the UV unit quartz sleeve cracking, thus water entering the electrics at the end of the UV tube, but thankfully, when I checked that morning before going to work had noticed what had happened, and just unplugged the UV power and re-started the system, providing the air and water circulation. However I did notice that all the koi looked rather washed out, which I believe was due to the lack of oxygen in the water, as after only a few minutes, there colours were starting to come back and looking fine when I checked at lunch time, this of course should have been ringing warning bells, but as there was not a problem on that occasion, I thought all was OK!!!!

One thing that I really regret on that Bank Holiday, is that I did not check to see if everything was OK at the end of that evening when we finally packed up for the day. Also, due to the extremely poor weather on Sunday when it was raining rather heavily, I did not get out see them until about 2:30pm in the afternoon, by which time most of my Koi collection was dead!!!!

I was absolutely mortified, I felt physically sick to see some floating on top and the rest lying on the bottom. Of course, by now, after this shock, I went into overdrive to try and save them, both Deborah and I was hurriedly trying our best to get some fresh water into the system and investigate what had caused the power to trip out. I did not want to simply re-set, as I or someone else could have been electrocuted. After establishing everything was correct, and by now I was taking out the dead koi who where very stiff and very slimy, with no signs of life, so very little hope of saving any, but there were two or three that responded to being held in front of the venturi, this both Deborah and myself tried to revive about six, for well over four hours, we managed to save three fish, two koi and one Golden carp, which we some how got when we first had our original pond way back in 1981-2, which we believe came from an egg on some pond plants.

Some of the Koi that had been lost, were from our very first pond, which were brought at about the same time, so even though they were not of a significant value, two or three were from our first ever Koi that we purchased between 1982-85. Then the rest were from our last collection that we had collected between the mid ninety’s to 2001. Anyway, what can I say, we were very attached to these, our very beautiful koi, some where as you expect, quite expensive, but its not just that aspect that really hurt, it was the fact that when we had moved house back in 1994, we had kept these koi and added to the collection in what I would call temporary permanent facilities, with no major problems, it just goes to show that we had effectively been running the system to its limits with regards to the oxygen content. All other parameters were zero, so the filtration system had done a great job, as you will see from the photos, this has been an ongoing development whilst building our ultimate pond over the last five years, but that’s another story and may be one for the newsletter.

 I cannot say how this tragedy happened exactly, only that I should have checked it last thing at night, and again in the morning as I would normally have done and now always do, regardless of anything, a hard lesson to have been learnt.

Due to either a tragic set of circumstances or just plain bad luck, the end result was 17 dead Koi due to lack of oxygen!!!! These Koi size ranged from about 34 inches, 2 off at this size, with the rest between 12 and 30 inches, mostly on the larger size. The survivors were about 10 inches, with the carp about 12 inches. With only two surviving Koi and one none Koi, probably due to his hardiness and the size of the other two small Koi...

After that very difficult nock back, the drive to complete the pond in 2001 was completely decimated, as was all of our family….But with time, and a very understanding wife, Deborah brought me a rather nice Kohaku for that Christmas from Selective Koi Sales, when we went on a trip with Andy and Janine, that has been the start to re establishing our collection of Koi, some of which are being kindly looked after by Andy and Janine in their very nice 6500gal heated pond, which some of you may have seen when we had our visit earlier this year. Yes, I still have a few Koi in the same quarantine facility, there are six Koi, plus the golden carp, all doing very well, I’ve even re-started the pond project, but again that another story, so...

Happy and safe Koi Keeping…!!!! 

Regards

Chris & Deborah Pinchen