And here is one of the beautiful koi being lifted from the muddy waters.

Watch the video below of the koi being lifted.

In the next video, Miya-san transfers the koi from the bowl into the vats on the pick-up, ready for the precarious transfer back down the mountain to the facility.

This selection of high quality Doitsu kohaku and sanke from Shinoda will be back in Ireland in November.

Saturday - we visited this local koi show near to Kaneko's facility.

At the bullring, near Shinoda's.

There wasn't much happening, but we saw a few of these guys standing around.

A view from near Yamakoshi.

Well, we were the first people to see the newly harvested nissai at Miyatora san's. I couldn't help picking some stunners.

We went up into the mountains to check out these pools and lower the water level a bit, ready for harvesting next week. There are ponds everywhere!

Just had to take this shot of the scenery on the way back down towards Ojiya.

Here is a cracking view from Oofuchi's house. He lives away high up in the mountains.

A couple of pics from Miya-san's garden.

One of ponds we harvested was full of fry - which are just left at the side of the pond. I couldn't help thinking how proud we would be to have 'baby koi' at home!

A nice pic of the lads lifting some nissai.

The video below is from the same pond. This was away up the mountain. There are many dangers which we know nothing about. Being through it all helps you to appreciate what these men do so we can have beautiful nishikigoi.

Watch Kentaro-san and Norimisu-san working together.

Tuesday we lifted some huge koi.

Bacause they are so big we carry them to the truck in bags.

Kentaro deals with the big ones!

and I can do the wee ones.

The video shows some of the fish we lifted today (Tuesday 16th).

There are many beautiful sights in Japan.

These are some of the nissai which I harvested and will be bringing back to Ireland in 3 or 4 weeks time.