Day Four

Today we were visiting one of my very favourite breeders of Nishikigoi in the whole of Japan, Sekiguchi.

It is an hours drive and therefore not visited by many other dealers, but they are really missing out. You can’t begin to explain what is so special about Sekiguchi Showas without having one in a bowl in front of you. The skin quality is of a type that you don’t find anywhere else and if you don’t have one in your collection I feel you are missing out on a whole new learning experience. He is also famous for producing Pearl Gin Rin and these are also something special, though very hard to purchase as so few are currently produced.

Toru had arranged for me to spend some time with the breeder talking about the farm and their koi and it was time I used wisely and got some full and detailed answers about their work. The final comment from the breeder said it all, business is thriving, he proclaimed and his koi are more popular than ever as their quality is appreciated by more buyers.

After spending time looking at the sold koi, which included all the Pearl Gin Rin, and the standard grade Showa, he took us to the Tatgeoi house where his sons were apparently netting a pond so that I could select a handful of high grade Tosai.

When we got there we found several outdoor ponds of very active koi, far too active in what should have been very cold water as it was surround by deep snow. However on checking I found that the water was actually quite warm and it turned out that they were using water from a well on a constant feed which was then heavily injected with air to ensure the oxygen levels were OK, stocking levels were also light in these ponds to ensure there was sufficient air to go round.

When we moved into the tategoi house we found the sons had a pond netted and were grading the fish. I looked into the pond and was a little disappointed as I hoped that I would have been selecting from the highest grade below his tategoi, and I could see these in the next pond along. However it turned out that because they had not yet finished grading these fish they had not had time to net the top grade pond for me and apoligised, but assured me that if I would like to come back first thing on Friday morning it would all be ready for me. It is a fair drive and we already have a number of other appointments to keep at the end of the week, but having seen the quality of the koi in this pond, it was a chance we were not going to miss. Of course I also spent a good bit of my time there looking at his keepers, the tategoi. These were out of this world and where Clive P’s stunning example would have come from. Unfortunately I wanted more than one so I had to move down a little in grade though the standard would still be far higher than I had selected Tosai from before..

After making all the arrangements for Friday we started our journey back. I asked Toru if we could pop in and see Takehashi and he called him up. Unfortunately he had taken a fall in Tokyo and injured his back so he too put us off until Friday.

We got back to the mountains and headed off to see Yamazaki who breeds shiny yellow and white fish, Hariwake, Yamabuki and Purachina in scaled but mostly Doitsu versions as well as a number of other varieties, including a few of the dreaded long fins.

Selection by the dealers was carried out to meet customer orders and the needs of their businesses and a good price was obtained for a few boxes.

After a coffee with the breeder it was back to the car where Toru realised it was mid-afternoon and he had missed out on a lunch break. That was tough, because we didn’t have time to find anywhere now and had to fit in another breeder before last light.

The last stop of the day was at Shinoda, famous for his Doitsu Go Sanke and big Hi Utsuri’s.

He didn’t have a lot of nissai stock left and Toru made this point to him when the dealers were selecting. As a result they got the koi at around 60% of their normal price. The bargain prices didn’t last when we moved onto the big girls though where there were plenty available, and he wanted a frightening amount for a 70cm Hi Utsuri. It was a figure that would have put a £3500 price tag on the koi in the UK, so not surprisingly was turned down.

Heavy snow had been falling for most of the afternoon, and we made sure Toru engaged 4wd and drove us slowly back to town.

Dinner was Japanese again, with a visit to an all you can eat restaurant. I started with Sushi, avoiding the whole baby squid for some reason and then moved on to the cooked foods. I’ll never know what was in all the batter or breadcrumb coated dishes, but I did recognise the quails eggs, chicken, sweet potatoes, pork, squid and cabbage. Some of the others though I will never know about, never want to know about and will hopefully never try again.

Back to the hotel where a few minutes of catching up with the e-mails and PM’s before a power nap took me through to midnight and I then spent an hour on the forum posting the Name the Breeder threads and seeing who was brave enough to hazard a guess.