Koi & Pond Fish

Pond stock, not tank stock: domestic assorted and red-and-white koi, assorted butterfly koi at 4 inches and up, shubunkin, comet and pool comet goldfish, and rainbow dace for the top of the water column. Koi are the long commitment here — they reach two feet and outlive most dogs, so the question is pond volume and winter depth, not tank size.

If you are stocking a small water feature, buy comets and shubunkins and skip the koi; they colour up just as well and stay a size the feature can hold. Adding fish to an established pond is the one case where quarantine is not optional: you cannot medicate a pond the way you medicate a tank, and one carrier reaches every fish in it. Take these quarantined.