Yes, koi definately eat more then goldfish because they are going to grow much larger then goldfish. Get some high protein koi food for the summer months. I like the Nishikoi growth food. They make it in mini pellets for small goldfish and koi.

My eight koi eat about 60 pounds of food a year. Your young koi will grow to about a foot in the first year and that takes more food than any goldfish of comparable size. When I am home I feed my fish eight or more times a day. Each time they act like it is the first time they have been fed that day. When the water is warm, which it should be now, don't be shy about feeding your fish. Scale the food back as the water cools in the fall.

I go through 40 pounds of food in about a month with my koi. So yeah....by virtue of their sheer size and also their growth potential, they eat WAY more than goldies

OK, now all of you have me thinking. I feed our 22" koi (5 of them) 11 lbs. of food a year. They seem very healthy and our water quality is very good.

The main reason I feed my eight koi so much is to discourage them from messing with the watercress and the hyacinths. When I am gone, the housesitter doesn't feed them so much and they do nibble on the plants a bit. When they are well fed they almost don't touch the vegetation.

I'm sure they would get by just fine on way less food.

Thanks for the input. The koi don't mess with my plants but I've seen the fish spawn and only found one small baby so the fish are eating the fry. The a\other koi isn't as big a feeder. Maybe if I fed them less they'd eat the algae that clings to the edge of the pond!

How much is recommended when feeding Koi? I have 4 Koi. I don't feed very much and I'm fearful I am not feeding them enough. I usually feed a small amount about every three days.

With summer water temperatures you should feed koi twice a day or more. You should give them enough that they finish it in about five minutes. If they finish it in a minute you are not giving them enough. If there is food left after ten minutes you gave them too much.

midwest, you can tell if they are not getting enough. Slow growth rate is one sign....but that may not be such a bad thing for smaller ponds. When they are REALLY getting too little feed, you may notice the head seems larger in proportion to the rest of the fish. A healthy male koi body's will taper out a little from behind the skull, a female will taper out a lot. Healthy females are built just like a torpedo. In a fish that is starving, you will see the body dip in right behind the skull. I'll see if I can find some pictures on the web somewhere of what a starving fish looks like. But the big head is a pretty obvious sign.

My koi definitely eat more than goldfish and are more destructive to the plants. They open their mouths and skim the surface like Hoover vacuums. I have to distract them in order to get the other fish some food. If you have enough plant and algae in your pond you don't really even need to feed them in the summer. That's more for us humans. Personally I don't want them to get too large or we'll have to sell them. Our pond can't support two foot koi.

Nancyd, so your solution to having koi in a pond that is too small for them is to starve them in hopes of stunting their growth? Sorry for being rude, but I couldn't think of a nice way to make the point. In my opinion people that have small ponds should stick to goldfish, mosquito fish, or minnows.

I agree with you Larryl. It's sort of like getting a great Dane Puppy and not feeding it enough so it stays the size of a Boxer. If you don't have room for a particular variety of fish, then stick to a variety that takes up less room. A koi that is not fed properly is a very sorry sight. I am sorry if this offends anyone, but I care about my koi just like I do my dogs. They are pets to me and I will only give them the very best of care.

I agree also.

So many people have koi when they should have goldfish. Goldfish come in many colors and have great personalities and are so much easier to care for properly.

Many people have living koi in ponds that they shouldn't but that doesn't mean their koi are thriving.

Ponds that are too shallow, too small or not properly filtered harm them as much as not feeding them correctly.