Koi, shubunkin and the ugly duckling betta

[Romy]

Pumpkinhead came from Petsmart, from the side she is kind of blah, but looks really cool from above. Some day we'll build a pond for her to live in.

Yellow is feeling a bit better and putting weight on. Yay! He came from a breeder.

Orange, the shubunkin. I love the scattering of metallic scales.

This is my pretty "rescue" girl. I bought her from petsmart, she was in one of their display tanks with about 30 other female bettas, who were all beating the crap out of each other. I saw her, brown and tattered to bits hiding underneath a tank decoration while the others duked it out, so brought her home. She has literally blossomed. Her fins grew back, she's a gorgeous red color, and she bosses the koi around. For now they aren't too big for her, and she's enjoying having a ginormous tank essentially to herself.

 

[Doberluv]

Oh! They are just gorgeous. I'm so glad Yellow came around. And what a nice thing to do...to save that beta. He's lookin' great. I love those shiny scales too. They must glow in the dark practically. Really nice, healthy looking fish.

 

[FoxyWench]

shubunkins are my favorites (next to butterfly koi)
there all very pretty!

 

[2pups622]

I have some Shubunkins in my pond also!

Oh & we also just added a Betta to the family!

 

[Izzy's Valkyrie]

I love the whiskers on Yellow

 

[Xandra]

Gotta love yer Yeller fish.

They look vibrant and well cared for.

Ponds are great but raccoons are awful on them. It sucks to lose fish that you've raised to a nice size to stupid raccoons

 

[Romy]

Thanks! I searched forever to find a yellow koi, and finally had to track down a local breeder who had some. It was lucky, lol.

When we build a pond we're going to put in a borzoi paddock (that pond diving charlie isn't allowed into) and put the pond in there. That way the raccoons will stay away...or the dogs will have a smaller food bill.

 

[Doberluv]

My sister has a koi pond and has to put chicken wire over the top to keep the racoons out. She has so many racoons that one Easter long ago, she hid all the eggs for the kids in the early morning before they got up and could spy. By the time the Easter egg hunt came along, every egg was gone. Racoons can be a nuissance.

I think your dogs will look better than chicken wire over the pond.

 

[FoxyWench]

my parents use chickenwire over their pond during the spring as we have a neighborhood heron who only seems to come through in the spring.

 

[Romy]

lol @ the easter eggs!

Our chicken hutch is outside the dog fence, and the first night after I repainted their door I went out and it was covered in raccoon paw prints. Evil little things. There is also a heron rookery about a quarter of a mile up from our house along the beach cliffs, so they pass by a lot. My brother said that you can plant overhanging bushes around your pond and that discourages them. Though, Strider should be enough lol! His life long dream is to catch and eat a heron. After he chased one for 2 miles down the beach, and cut his foot on an oyster shell and still kept going he's not allowed down there any more.

Random trivia, peacocks hate herons and will attack them on sight. We can't have free roaming peacocks, but just throwing that out there for anyone reading this.

 

[FoxyWench]

i need to move where you are romy...land, chickens, beach...lol.