Summer time in Japan is packed full of festivals, from small towns to big cities. Niigata prefecture is famous for its firework displays at their festivals. Nagaoka is said to have one of the best displays in all of Japan, possibly even the world. Kashiwazaki also has an impressive display. Katakai shoots off the worlds largest firework every year at their festival, its a 1 meter diameter shell; and it makes the ground shake when it goes off. Ojiya also shoots off fireworks at their festival, but nothing like the other cities. Something special that Ojiya has is the parade where groups of people from the different areas of Ojiya make their own Mando. A Mando is kind of like a float in an American parade, but usually it is some kind of character.
Around the first of August, I had been helping build the Mando for Higashi Yama along with many of the residents of the area including Marusaka's son Teruyuki & Izumiya's son Ryu. Work had already started on the Mando before I showed up to help, and many long nights were put in to get it finished up in time for the festival on the 22nd & 23rd of the month. Higashi Yama's Mando was a giant blue dog, I think it is the mascot for Niigata News. It lit up and had movable arms and a rotating head, all controllable from beneath the platform it sat on. It was affixed to a 2 ton truck fitted with speakers, a small tv (where Billy's Boot Camp was played on a loop), along with parady paintings on the side, and last but not least lots of alcohol!
Along with the Mando-sha (Mando truck) there was also a Hayashi. The Hayashi was a 4 ton truck with a roof and lanterns set up on it for the festival. On the Hayashi drums and seats were set up so we could play traditional Festival music with Japanese recorders, taiko drums and a small bell. As with the Mando-sha, it was also fitted with enough alcoholic beverages to drown a donkey.
I rode on the Hayashi and was assigned to play a drum on the first night, even though I had no idea what to do. They said to just guess and go along with the flow. This was on Saturday, so it was during the fireworks display, so the Mando parade wasn't the main attraction of the night. On Sunday night the Mando was one of the main attractions though, so a lot of us got dressed up in different costumes ranging from Dragon Ball Z characters to Japanese comedians. I donned white body tights suit painted my face yellow and wore a lemon over my head, mimicking a Japanese comedian.
It is tradition to chug bottles of sake all together, so lots of alcohol was consumed. I remember Saturday night for the most part, but I blacked out on Sunday. Monday morning I woke up with one shoe, and a newly decorated body. I did find my shoe later when I was driving home though.
As if we didn't drink enough at the festival, we just had the Otsukarasama (thanks for all the hard work) drinking party last night...
I need to go cull my pond now.
Sunday, August 30, 2009
Wednesday, August 19, 2009
Devin's Pond
First Cull
I did the first cull on the 14th of the month, just 18 days after releasing my kohaku fry. I may have culled a little too early, but for the most part you could make out patterns on the fry. It worked out better to do it on the 14th because it was the first day of a 3 day break for Marudo due to the national Obon holiday. Any of the days after and an impeading hangover from the drinking to be had might have interfered with the quality of culling!
Most of the fry were between 2-3 cm in size, and there was a lot of step patterns in the lot. We recently culled another pond of kohaku fry from the same Oyagoi set and step patterns seemed to be prominent in them too. So it will be interesting too see how they turn out. I culled down to 1,800 fry from 15,000, its kind of a lot for the size of my pond; but they'll soon be culled again. Many were kept because they were too small and the pattern hadn't quite emerged on them, but now with less fish in the pond they'll have room to develop and grow.
Mark Gardener came by to help cull and shoot a video of the day, his video and blog can be viewed at www.niigata-nishikigoi.com
I did the first cull on the 14th of the month, just 18 days after releasing my kohaku fry. I may have culled a little too early, but for the most part you could make out patterns on the fry. It worked out better to do it on the 14th because it was the first day of a 3 day break for Marudo due to the national Obon holiday. Any of the days after and an impeading hangover from the drinking to be had might have interfered with the quality of culling!
Most of the fry were between 2-3 cm in size, and there was a lot of step patterns in the lot. We recently culled another pond of kohaku fry from the same Oyagoi set and step patterns seemed to be prominent in them too. So it will be interesting too see how they turn out. I culled down to 1,800 fry from 15,000, its kind of a lot for the size of my pond; but they'll soon be culled again. Many were kept because they were too small and the pattern hadn't quite emerged on them, but now with less fish in the pond they'll have room to develop and grow.
Mark Gardener came by to help cull and shoot a video of the day, his video and blog can be viewed at www.niigata-nishikigoi.com
Wednesday, August 05, 2009
Devin's Pond
I'm raising Kohaku fry this year, on 7-27-09 I received 15,000 offspring of a Hoshikin female bred with a Nogami male. The Hoshikin female has a 3 step pattern with very good skin quality, and the Nogami male is around 75cm in length, with a decent body for a male. I haven't even started the first cull yet, but I am looking forward to see how these koi develop.
The pond I'm using is different from the previous years at Tatsushiro, the pond I am using is at the very top of Myoken Mountain. Myoken is where many of Marudo's best nisai & sansai are grown, the mud there produces very good hi. In regards to size, the pond is about the same size as the pond I used previously, about 30' by 30' and 3 1/2 feet deep. The only problem with the new pond at Myoken is that it is at the very top of the mountain, so the is no constant water supply. So, if it doesn't rain enough, my pond could dry up, luckily this year there has been plenty of rain this far.
Since releasing the fry on the 27th I've only been able to check my pond a couple of times because I've been assigned to work else where. As of the 4th of August (8 days) my fry have already grown to about 1.5 to 2 cm in length, compared to about 1 cm or a little under when they were released. I believe the fast growth is due to the abundance of daphnia in the pond.
At this rate I'm hoping to do the first cull around the 16th of the month, maybe sooner...
The pond I'm using is different from the previous years at Tatsushiro, the pond I am using is at the very top of Myoken Mountain. Myoken is where many of Marudo's best nisai & sansai are grown, the mud there produces very good hi. In regards to size, the pond is about the same size as the pond I used previously, about 30' by 30' and 3 1/2 feet deep. The only problem with the new pond at Myoken is that it is at the very top of the mountain, so the is no constant water supply. So, if it doesn't rain enough, my pond could dry up, luckily this year there has been plenty of rain this far.
Since releasing the fry on the 27th I've only been able to check my pond a couple of times because I've been assigned to work else where. As of the 4th of August (8 days) my fry have already grown to about 1.5 to 2 cm in length, compared to about 1 cm or a little under when they were released. I believe the fast growth is due to the abundance of daphnia in the pond.
At this rate I'm hoping to do the first cull around the 16th of the month, maybe sooner...
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