On the contrary, leaves that once were green, then going through the stages of yellowing, browning, eventually turning black is definitely a cue that you are overwatering. Leaves turn black because they are not able to further take up moisture. The roots are sitting in too much water...forcing the plant to draw water up, until such time, the plant is unable to proceed any further. Root rot sets in....the leaves are the first sign of any problem that is caused from such watering practices. At the stage of blackness, it has gone on far too long. Yellow leaves might be the first sign of overwatering---along with other possible causes...but overwatering, being the one biggest reason for trouble, should be thought of first. As the water is no longer able to do anything for the plant....even tho, water is sitting only a few inches away...the leaves are unable to draw any more, they are saturated...and so will turn black. I think one of the easiest ways to have such result is by not having something between the soil and the drainage holes and letting the drainage water sit too long under the plant causing it to draw water it once got rid of, to be drawn back up and if the plant cant use it, it sits there, drowning the roots. Distilled water is a viable choice if you believe the water from your tap has something in it that might cause problems. But there are other sources of water without going the distilled route. Bottled water---very common these days...water that has sat for days in a watering can or water from snow you have brought in and allowed to gain room temperature can be used. Plants react to changes that are abrupt. Cold drafts from floor vents or open doorways can cause yellowing leaves. Too high nighttime temperatures can cause browning tips and edges.

Night Hawk is so happy in his new home. i have him inside the laudry room, very dark and quite. Inside the preformed pond. I filled it up last night and ran the pump in it all night. Mike, i just knew you would say that would better, so i got it ready while you slept :) and then when i got online.. yes, i did the right thing. But i just now moved him so it ran for over 6 hours.. :) When i put Night Hawk in the pond he swam all around and when i put the net over the top he was sitting on the ledge right way up. YEAH.. i think his might be ok. Thank you Erie for trying to help also. It was a storage plastic tub that Night Hawk was in. but i was real worried when i saw Mike say that i should change the watter so frequently. I thought this might stress Night Hawk out even more. should i put some stress eze stuff in the pond with him?? i put in the salt and kio clay ( i don't know if the clay helps but i thought it might). Mike, i will get the specs on the pump for you. About the water fall; it is 8-10 ft from the bottom of the pond to the top of the water fall (if you measure straight up in the air) the legnth of the watter fall is 12-13 ft. and it is 2 ft wide. the pump just sits on the bottom, we don't have a skimmer. we keep the filter pads in the watter fall box thingey .. i don't know the proper name off the top of my head. we have 4 diffrent color pads in there. ( we are using the same system now on the other pond, but with a much smaller pump) we don't want the watter to run to hard down it due to the splashing and watter loss. i reall need to rework the entire thing. the pond my fish are in now is 4 ft deep 3 foot across (short way) and 5 ft across the long way. There is 9 kio, 3 commets, 6 shubukin, in the pond now. When i got the fish the idea was to have the 3 commets in the preformed pond 55 gallon, the koi were going to be in the large pond with the water fall and the shubukin in the deep pond. the bigest fish is a butterfly kio about 8 inches long tail and all. When we had the problem with the large pond i realized we were going to have problems with the freezing weather. i thought maybe i would bring them in for the winter but i realized that the cold and hybernation state is good for the fish. so to the deep pond they all went for the winter. it is suppose to be below 32 for the next few nights, and i don't have the pump for the big pond yet; but even then i'm worried to move them and have the watter freeze.. To fix the big pond i thought rather than take apart the liner that is sealed to the water fall liner and dig a deeper hole that i would be better to bring in the sand and raise the ground level to be even with the ground where the water fall ends. I have a bunch of extra liner on the side of the pond folded up under the rocks. The cat fish that my husband put in the big pond is no longer living there , we took him to the spring house and put him in the pond there. Before you mentioned that other fish will help him, should i bring in one of the small kio or commetts to stay with Night Hawk? i will get the specs on the pump filter system and let you know asap.. lori

If you can, net one of the sickest ones up and carefully peek under the gill cover at the gills. Healthy gills should be evenly colored, like raw steak. KHV, bacterial issues, and costia will make the gills goopy looking, white streaks, greenish decaying tissue, etc. If the gills are clean, the problem is not KHV. what worries me the most is that the goldfish are not sick and the koi are. KHV affects only koi. All other parasites/ issues would also affect the goldies. Salt is not a magical cure-all for whatever is wrong. It can help in some cases....but it can also make treatment impossible in others since some koi medications are not compatible with salt.

You'll want to check out the Desert Botanical Garden sale - the second weekend in October. They usually have some pretty large specimens. Not cheap, but if you join the DBG you get like 10% off. I haven't been to AZ Cactus sales, but I'd bet they might as well. Too bad you couldn't take your old one along --- I was just at the Huntington Botanical Garden outside of L.A.. They had the biggest ones I've ever seen. (If you'd like to see the picture, you'll have to go to Gardenweb, it won't show up in your e-mail.) The sign there said that these specimens were up to 75 years old and pretty slow growing, however I'm sure that sonotaps advice is good - just make sure you plant them in very fast draining soil (add pumice or rough sand, not playground sand if your soil has clay) and the amount of water they get won't be as big of an issue. HTH, good luck in your search!