Koi Ponds

I have recently had the pleasure of exploring the world of koi ponds. Its a mechanical wonderland with so many possibilities and options. I was in Kansas City this past week and had the pleasure to see a professional's personal koi pond...wow! Absolutely beautiful. Check out their link (Hix & Son) on the right margin when you get a chance. They also directed me to an excellent site, sacramentokoi.com, that had soooo much information and tons of how to info.
This whole trip was started by an experience I want to talk about. I was recently contacted to consult/build a koi pond, I guess I should say re-build a koi pond. Now I do not claim to be any sort of koi expert, but I do know there is a lot of difference between a koi pond and a water garden. If you want a koi pond, make sure you are very clear about your intentions to your contractor. You can say 'I want a koi pond' and they could still build you a two foot deep pond with shelves and bio filtration alone. This isn't a koi pond, its a water garden with fish. While koi and water gardens can get along to some extent, our own experiences have gone well, there are significant issues with this combination. See sacaramentokoi.com, 20 questions link, for all the reasons. I am by no means saying to not do a water garden with fish, I think they are a necessity, but you must understand goldfish and koi have different effects, and will greatly change your biological setup.
A 'true' koi pond should have no shelves, with steep sides and be at least 4 feet deep. Water plants cause problems; koi rooting through them, carrying diseases, harder to catch a koi you must treat, salt and water plants don't mix, etc... Bottom drains are basically a necessity, and very helpful in watergardens of large size. And the filtration! Koi ponds make water gardens look amazingly simple. There is way too much information to include in one post, but check out the links I've mentioned if you are interested in a koi pond.
To try and wrap up this lengthy post, make sure you know what you want, what you're getting into, and that you communicate your desires clearly to the builder. Otherwise you could very well end up with a cookie-cutter water garden that won't be able to sustain the amount or size of koi you desire. Make sure you get what you want and its done right.