Koi In Iowa!! The journey to Koi Kiche....

The journey to Koi Kiche.... My Grandpa Primrose kept an aqaurium at their home in Vinton. This is probably my first recolection of staring at fish. Back in the 1980's My cousin doug and I would take our scene net and go catch Carp and Buffalo head in the palo creek. My friends and I would go to the backwaters of the Cedar River and Catch bullfrogs My first pond-building experience has to be taking our shovels down to Palo Creek and building a dam and watching the creek build up till it overflowed and burst the dam. While I was in the Army in Germany in 1987 I kept this 10 gallon aqaurium in my barraks room. I had decided that the aquaurium was too small, and the goldfish needed a bigger home. When I bought my house in Toddville Iowa in 1993, I set up this 55 gallon aqaurium and a few goldfish. My aqaurium collection quickly expanded with two 30 gallon, four 10 gallon, and a 20 gallon in my cubicle at work! I had decided that the aquauriums were too small, and the goldfish needed a bigger home. 1995. My first pond was a hole in the ground lined with 4mil black plastic. It lasted about a month before a storm came and a branch fell out of the tree and punctured the liner. 1996. So I decided to build them a pond. A BIG pond. Here you can see digging is completed. 1996. Liner is installed. Begin to fill with water. 1996. Pond is full of water. 1996. Pond is finished. Gazebo is finished. 1997. Sod starting to look nice 1998. Upper Stream and Millhouse are constructed. 1999. Skimmer and bottom drains are retro-fitted. 2000. Lower stream and Cattail bog are constructed. 2001. Plants starting to look nice. 2002. Plants really overgrown now. 2003. 2004. Bridge over stream constructed. New filter is constructed.