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I'm in Upland, California today.
I'm at Mystic Koi and we're gonna be shooting some more koi discussion videos.
Today our topic is gonna be on how to distinguish a male koi versus a female koi,
and as you know I got Shawn McHenry on deck, the koi expert to talk us through this.
Lets begin.
>> Eric! Whats going on man?
>> Shawn, how are you?
>> Great, great, great man.
>> Look at you and your beanie today.
>> Dude, oh, it's freezing out here, you know?
>> It's like 55 here in California.
>> Yeah. >> Southern California,
it's freezing of course [LAUGH].
>> All right then, the viewers wanna know, I get asked this all the time.
>> Yeah. >> And, you know,
I am a little bit of a rookie at explaining why I think I get the point across.
What I wanted from an expert what, how can we differentiate male koi verses female koi?
>> Oh, sure. >> Everyone asks you.
>> Yeah all the time.
>> Okay. >> All the time.
And absolutely we're gonna answer that today, what the difference between a male and
a female and talk about what the points are, but I wanna talk about something a lot more interesting.
That's exactly about that topic.
>> Okay. >> That is why you wanna
know if it's a male or a female.
>> Okay. >> All right?
>> Well let's jump into the new business first.
>> Yeah, yeah. Sure, of course.
>> Okay, who do you got for us?
>> I'm gonna pull up a big girl and a big boy, and we'll take a look at the two.
>> Perfect.
See, this where it's a little easier for me to distinguish males and females.
You know, as, as a, a novice, like okay, we have a big female here.
>> Sure. >> Versus big male.
So, I'm really looking forward to as they get younger.
How old is this koi?
>> She's four, four years old.
>> Four, wow.
She's massive.
>> And then let's grab another four year old koi.
>> Okay. >> I'm gonna grab a Showa.
>> Okay. Four year old male.
>> Four year old male.
>> Okay.
>> So, the first thing you might just notice right now is
males a lot more ornery than females are.
>> Is that true?
>> I think it is.
>> All right. >> Males they actually when you're,
when you're feeding your koi.
>> Uh-huh.
>> Males will tend to go up, grab food and then zip right back down.
>> Flip their tail up.
>> Right, right.
Where a female is, she's a smooth lady.
Like she'll come up, she'll grab that food, kind of like Pac, Pac-Man.
>> Yeah. >> Sort of suck in some food.
>> Delicate. >> Suck in some food.
And then just kind of mosey on, where a male is really, really aggressive.
And so I find like,
moving males versus moving females, females tend to be a lot more gentle in the hand.
>> Did you see that all the way down, like down into tosai?
I mean it's hard to tell in tosai, but
say like- >> No, no.
>> Second year, third year?
>> Yeah, it's usually more mature fish, definitely.
>> Okay. >> Definitely.
>> So let's take a look at these.
If you notice, believe it or not, these two koi are about the same size.
>> Okay. >> And and so yes, they have the same length.
A lot of their, their body parts are pretty much the same, the fins and tails,
things like that.
But there's a huge, an absolutely huge difference in the thickness of the Koi.
>> Yeah.
>> I mean I can, you can, you can see from here to where that's almost
the entire width of my hand.
>> Right.
>> And that's gonna be what is known as the biggest difference between males and females.
>> In the girth looking down, the width, right?
>> Exactly.
>> Okay, so the question, the questions that arise are probably like, okay well,
will this guy max out at, lets say 30 inches and this one is gonna keep going?
It's so, is, that's prevalent?
>> Sure.
Whether it's male or
female isn't as important as the bone structure is important, right?
>> For size?
>> Exactly.
>> Okay. >> So for, for length, we're,
we're more concerned about the tail joint and how thick that is.
Where in male and female she,
this guy is gonna get really long and may just never fill it out bulk wise.
>> Right.
Yeah, I mean the, the base right there is like as thick as my wrist back there-.
>> Yeah, exactly, exactly.
>> And this one, this one's like my daughter's wrist.
>> Right [LAUGH]. >> So that's something good to point out,
may be, may be hard to see.
>> Another big difference to point out between a male and female is,
in the springtime, if you're trying to identify which is your male, which is your
female, in the springtime, their cheeks, male cheeks will actually get really rough.
So I can go down here and you can feel his cheeks and
they will actually be, they feel like stubble believe it or not.
Right now it's winter time so we can't feel that at all,.
>> Okay >> But that's a great way
>> So tell us why's that?
I mean.
>> It's I think it's sexual excitement, excitement sort of thing.
>> Is that why you're all bearded up today?
>> Oh, yeah.
I'm so excited.
>> You're always bearded up.
[LAUGH].
>> [LAUGH] I'm always excited.
>> Okay, well that's, that's interesting.
Okay, so, I mean, at this point, okay, this is a female, this a male.
And I know that.
It's easy.
She's really thick, he's slender.
>> Right.
>> Base of the tail is thick like, you know, a man's wrist, and
this is more petite like a woman's wrist.
>> Mm-hm.
>> Okay that's fine, I don't need to check the stubble in the spring time on these koi.
>> Right. >> So how does that translate down the line,
because most people aren't gonna buy fish this big, they're gonna maybe try and
start smaller and try and identify it earlier.
>> Sure. >> So
is that something that can be identified in a second year koi, or a third year koi, or?
>> Well, I,
I like to personally, I like to identify two year old and up, I find that's fairly easy.
Koi breeders in Japan, will actually be able to identify tosai male, female.
>> Right, cuz they just have.
Yeah [CROSSTALK] thousands and thousands.
>> They're just, they're just magicians. Yeah.
>> Yeah.
>> Those guys know what they're doing.
And even then they get it wrong to be honest with you.
>> Yeah. >> So it's, it's real,
real tricky thing but let's, let's put these guys back.
Let's pull up a couple other fish and >> Perfect, perfect.
>> We'll talk about some distinguishing differences in a younger male and female.
>> Perfect.
Good plan.
Let's put them up.