XXVIII.-ON CARP CULTURE, CHIEFLY IN ITS RELATION TO 



AGRICULTURE.* 



By Eben-Bauditten. 

 [Read at a meeting of the Prussian Fishery-Association at Elbing, July, 1877. ] 



Wliilst our farmers are making the greatest exertions to increase the 

 productiveness of their lands by labor, intelligence, and cai^ital, they 

 generally neglect the sheets of water found in their possession, and it is 

 high time that attention is given to the waters. Carp-culture may be 

 considered as one of the principal means of making the water produc- 

 tive. 



In early spring, when all nature awakes from her winter sleep, the 

 carp becomes a source of income to the farmer by the sale of fish two, 

 three, and more years old. In autumn, when the farmer is depressed 

 by cares and anxieties because the summer has brought too much rain 

 or too great heat, so that he has not even been able to work his fields 

 in a rational manner, the carp, which is not influenced by the above- 

 mentioned extremes of the weather, will be the principal source of 

 income. 



Whilst it requires a vast amount of care and labor to procure the 

 quantity of feed which the cattle need during seven months of winter, 

 the carp, so to speak, sleeps all through winter, and may therefore weU 

 be termed the best domestic animal. 



Carp-culture, i. e., the raising of carp, must be strictly distinguished 

 from the Iceeping of carp when young carj) are procured from i^isci- 

 cultural establishments. Kearly every farm will offer the necessary 

 conditions for keeping carp, while carp-culture requires a number of 

 ponds, e. g., the pond for the young fry, the pond for the larger (the 

 growing) carp, and the pond for wintering the carp. On this last- 

 mentioned pond the success of the carp-culture mainly depends ; whilst 

 the ponds for the young and the growing carp may be shallow, the 

 wintering-pond should be 8 to 12 feet deep, and should have some flow- 

 ing water even during the severest cold. If the current is so strong 

 that the water is always more or less in motion, the wintering-pond 

 need not be quite so deep. 



If these conditions cannot be fulfilled, the winteriug-i)ond will never 

 afford absolute security, and the result will therefore be doubtful. In 



* Ueber Karpfenzucht, hauptsachlich mit Bezug auf unsere Landwirthschaft. [From the 

 " Deutsche Fischerei-Zeitung," Vol. II, No. 14, Stettin, April 8, 1879.] Translated by 

 Herman Jaeobson. 



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