It seems that there was a thread not too long back where some of you talked about fishing for koi. Then again, I could be crazy cause I can’t seem to find anything.
Anyone have experience fishing for these things? I was scouting out a new (to me) river a few days ago and saw a good sized (1.5-2lb) koi sunning himself. I didn’t have the rod with me, sure wish I had. Should I just tie up a fly that looks like fish food from a can? 
Oh MAN! That reminds me…I saw a BIG white fantail comet goldfish swimming around in front of me when I was fly-fishing in a pond during lunch today. Compared to the nice bluegills I was catching, I’d have to guess this fish was a good 12" long! Would have been really fun to hook! Even as big as it was, I can’t imagine how small of a hook I would have needed…
All I’ve been able to determine is that you need to catch them when they are feeding and match whatever they’re feeding on. Otherwise it’s luck of the draw.
The tough part is not getting caught fishing in someone’s fish pond:twisted:
Kevin
I’ve been a koi keeper since '95. That is I keep them as pets and even take mine to koi shows like one would do a horse at a horse show. I also fish for carp with my fly rod and it is my favorite target species. I do spend much of my time chasing trout, but fishing for carp on the fly is much different than landing an 10" brook trout.
You might enjoy this link, just about fishing for koi: http://acsdatacenter.com/index.php?showforum=37
The techniques described in this book would be appropriate and is the best resource that I have found on fly fishing for carp: http://www.amazon.com/Carp-Fly-Flyfishing-Barry-Reynolds/dp/1555661866
If you want a great audio listen, this is a very detailed explaination of how to fly fish for carp by one of the authors of the above book: http://www.askaboutflyfishing.com/speakers/brad/brad.cfm You don’t need an IPod to listen to it, you can listen to it on your computer. I do have it downloaded onto my IPod though.
Be careful playing on the dark side of fly fishing. People might look down their nose at you for fishing for carp, but all the while you will have a huge smile on your face. Enjoy,
Rick
I catch koi in an urban pond in the local park. Perhaps it is the location, but I find them much easier to catch than common carp. They seem to be less picky about depth, drift, presentation, and patterns.
I use slow-sinking, unweighted flies like wooly buggers and chartreuse glo-bugs (!). The Koi usually take the fly while it is sinking. Usually, they take it within 2 feet of the surface. Sometimes, they want a moderately active retrieve. They probably think the glo-bugs are corn or bread.
YOu need to get you one of these, then:
Be careful playing on the dark side of fly fishing. People might look down their nose at you for fishing for carp, but all the while you will have a huge smile on your face.
Carp guys get respect and admiration from me.
Recently, while walking (rodless) beside an urban river, I tried stalking a few shallow feeding carp. The fish were extremely wary of overhead threats. The only chances I had to view the animals for any amount of time was when their heads were temporarily buried in the moss and other plant material. Beyond that, it was typically an explosive mud cloud/disappearing act.
I thought that I would add a few more fun links. This is a TV show that you can watch about fly fishing for carp. It’s informative and intertaining: http://www.flymartonline.com/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=333
Then my favorite YouTube video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xc8KGLbiAi8
Enjoy,
Rick
No argument from me! Nice 'Gillzilla!! 
How big?
We have wild Koi in the US?
On a road trip completely around Taiwan we found koi in almost every body of water we passed. In city parks huge statues of koi hid fish food dispensers, where, for a buck or so, you get a tube of pellets to feed them. The fish would mob the spot to the point many fish were high and dry on the backs of the koi below.
Once, in Peace Park, downtown Taipei, a mother was holding her toddler on a dock and I told my son, then six, to give some pellets to the little girl to feed the koi. The obviously (apparantly) shy mother watched her daughter and my son feed the koi all the pellets and then in leaving thanked us in perfect English and humbly explained she had studied at Yale and Oxford.
Folks stopped and pointed knowingly at particular fish and clucked their tongues and shook their heads at the obvious perfection the occasional fish displayed. I never could figure out which fish they meant… Have to admit the idea of rollcasting a flashback never occurred to me.
Several times we went to restaurants renting fishing poles by the hour. See-meant ponds as Jed Clampett would say, stocked regularly with various species, usually shrimp, but some had crabs, lobster, or tilapia, or koi. “Sharks” showed up with cased, custom-built rods and showed obvious serious intent to catch their money’s worth of whatever the restaurant stocked.
Two tiny hooks are baited with either dried shrimp or chicken liver and a quill bobber for a modem. If you catch a double you get a free beer.
When enough fish or shellfish are caught they are brought back to a broiler area and you prepare them yourself, or hand them over to the kitchen staff and they do everything for you. To prepare them yourself the shrimp (freshwater) are skewered on bamboo and packed in rock salt for broiling. The technique is very good, the shrimp only mediocre, so it could have been a lot worse. Lots of good Chinese beer to wash it down, though…
art
They are illegally released into the wild by the tree huggers who think they are doing the fish a favor but are drastically misinformed.
I seriously doubt that “tree huggers” are releasing Koi into the wild, they tend to have issues with exotic species. If anything it’s someone who doesn’t want to keep it in their pond or aquarium any more.
Kevin
That would qualify as a tree hugger to me. 
If you don’t want the fish anymore, it’s your responsibility to find the fish a new home or put it down, but not release it because you think the one fish is more important that the enviroment that you release it into. Just one man’s opinion, your mpg may vary.