Ozumi Ikarashi Koi Farm is the farm that created the Kin Kikokuryu and the Beni Kikokuryu. If you own one of those metallic Doitsu fish whose black comes and goes with the season, the line traces back to Ozumi, a district of Nagaoka, Niigata, where Hidetoshi Ikarashi runs the farm with his uncle Kazuhiro. ChampKoi imports koi from Ozumi Ikarashi.
Ikarashi is a common name in Nagaoka koi, and this farm is often mixed up online with Ikarashi Koi Farm in Yamakoshi. They are separate operations. Pond counts and hectare figures you may have seen attached to Ozumi Ikarashi belong to the Yamakoshi farm, so we have left them out.
The Kikokuryu are the headline, but the depth of the farm is in kawarimono and metallics generally: Ochiba, Chagoi, Goshiki, Asagi and Ginrin Asagi, Yuki Asagi and Kigoi all come out of these ponds. This is not a Gosanke farm. If you want Kohaku or Showa, buy from Isa or Torazo on our list. If you want an Ochiba with real depth of colour, or a fish nobody else at the club will have, this is the list to look at.
One practical note on Beni Kikokuryu: the red on this variety can fade or shift as the fish grows, and the metallic skin is what carries it when the pattern moves. Buying from the breeder who set the standard for the variety is the simplest way to stack the odds.
