Part III.] Pond Fish Culture. 125 



and Asia. The fish was brought to this country more than 

 twenty-five years ago, and is more or less common in the lakes 

 and streams throughout the United States. It seems to be gen- 

 erally despised by sportsmen throughout the country. How- 

 ever, it is a food fish and not a game fish, and according to 

 statistics is one of the most valuable food fishes of the Old 

 World, and judging from the statistics that are being published 

 it will soon be one of the leading, if not the leading, food fish 

 produced in our own country, 



Henry T. Finck, author of Food and Flavor, page 360, 

 N. Y., The Century Company, 1913, says: 



"All over Germany fish-breeding in ponds is an important 

 industry. Bavaria alone had, in 1909, over 33,000 acres of 

 such ponds, and probably has many more now; Saxony had 

 200,000 acres, while Silesia had nearly 60,000. The total area 

 of fish ponds in the Empire probably does not fall short of a 

 quarter of a million acres. 



"Carp are grown in special abundance, and German carp 

 are a very good fish to eat, especially when they have been 

 artificially fed and fattened with rice, potatoes, fish meal, or 

 dairy products." 



Doctor Forbes, of the Illinois Biological Survey, page 75 

 of the American Fisheries Society, says: "The carp is the 

 most abundant fish in the Illinois river, giving us $412,000 

 of income in 1908, while all other fishes together gave us 

 only $309,000." On page 78 he says, further, that "the 

 product of Black bass, according to the United States census 

 of this year, has risen from $11,000 for the Illinois river in 

 1899, to $58,000 in 1908, when the census statistics were ob- 

 tained." It would appear that the Black bass has increased 

 at the same time and in the same waters where the carp in- 

 creased. This is explained by saying that the carp is a food 

 fish for Black bass. 



The carp is found in nearly all Kansas streams and in many 

 of the ponds. It is a coarse fish and not such a good fish as the 

 bass, the crappie and the Channel catfish, but it is a food fish 

 of importance, and not bad to eat when properly handled and 

 prepared. It can usually be purchased in the market at about 

 one-half the price of the above-mentioned fishes. When com- 

 pared with the bass, the crappie and the Channel catfish, it is 

 compared with a few of the best fishes in the world. When 

 compared with such food fishes as the butterfish, the haddock, 

 the flounders, the hake, the pollock, and the cod, it is found 

 that it brings as much or even more than these fish do in New 

 York and other eastern fish markets. In the central part of 

 the United States it sells for about the same price as the 

 American carp, the redhorse and the buffalo fishes. 



It is one of the hardiest as well as one of the healthiest and 

 cleanest of fishes in our waters. The flesh of the carp, so far 

 as we have been able to discover, is practically free from the 



