Ooya Koi Farm

Ooya is a Sanke farm first and an Asagi farm second. Tetsutaro Kataoka started it in 1961 straight out of high school as Katasei Koi Farm, renamed it Ooya eleven years later, and built it around Taisho Sanshoku, the variety Niigata breeders joke will make you poor. His eldest son Taro Kataoka runs it now, and the Sanke are still the reason to buy.

The proof is on the show bench. At the 52nd All Japan Combined Nishikigoi Show, held in December 2021, an Ooya-bred Sanke took the Adult (Seigyo) Champion title in the 50 bu with the farm listed as owner, dealer and breeder. Taro's stated goal is white skin as clean as Niigata snow, and he chases it on the Asagi as well: soft blue reticulation, clean heads and strong hi on the flanks.

The farm sits in Koguriyama, a mountain hamlet of Ojiya on the Yamakoshi side, working mud ponds and greenhouses over roughly 50,000 square metres. Production is deliberately small. The ponds were wrecked in the 2004 Chuetsu earthquake and the family rebuilt in the hills instead of moving down to the plain like some neighbours. Tetsutaro also keeps Tsunotsuki fighting bulls, the old Yamakoshi tradition, and says the bulls and the koi come from the same culture.

Expect Sanke, Asagi, Kohaku, Showa, some Bekko and the odd Ginrin or Doitsu fish. You will not find jumbo Ogon or a long Kawarimono list here. If you want a Sanke that improves with age from a farm that has done one thing for sixty years, Ooya is a good place to spend the money. ChampKoi imports koi from Ooya Koi Farm.