At Living Jewel Koi we have spent a long time looking at the availability of different clays to the trade. The obvious go to was Japan, however when we looked at what was on offer we were unable to find any which presented above 87% purity.
 
We then trawled suppliers in The US and Europe and finally we landed on a clay quarried in France, the original home of Montmorillonite clay. The purity was a guaranteed minimum of 97% so we took a batch for testing.
 
After many months testing we were extremely happy with the results. The testing involved using in highly fouled vats, in tap water, and rain water. We took water readings before and after a single use and kept a record after continual use. In all cases the water quality improvements were significant.
 
We also tested with koi, sturgeon and goldfish to represent the ‘mixed pond’ of many hobbyists. No ill effects and vastly increased appetite was measured. The koi only vats recorded an increase of almost 23% food eaten within a 10 minute spell after using the clay for 2 months compared with a sample vat of equivalent koi using no clay.
 
So while there’s absolutely no doubt there are some high quality Japanese clays on the market we found many to be substandard and opted to go with this particular French Montmorillinite due to it’s extremely high purity in addition to the superb results. 
 
We work hard to only sell products we believe in hence the many months research.
 
NOT ALL CLAYS ARE EQUAL!