THE CARP AND ITS CULTURE. 875 



from nve to seven mouths in its winter sleep, during which it does not 

 grow. If this fish thrives so well in the countries which have such a 

 very cold winter (on an average they have the same winter- tempera- 

 ture as Boston, Chicago, Milwaukee, Pittsburgh, Philadelphia, New 

 York, Baltimore, and Saint Louis), where the rivers have not enough 

 food for these fishes by far, their level being regulated by dams, which 

 are a subject of constant complaint to the fishermen, how much more 

 would they thrive in the waters of this country with their great riches 

 of food ? But if we take into account the rivers of the mild south and 

 southwest of the United States, what success may not be expected for 

 this fish in those regions ! 



If the carp finds food in superfluity it will grow much more rapidly than 

 the above statement indicates. This gives an increase of from 3 to 3^ 

 pounds in one year and six months ; but this is only the normal one, the 

 food consumed being of an average amount. If the fish obtain food very 

 plentifully it will grow more rapidly. In this case, again, it is to be 

 considered that the waters of the milder climates of this country pos- 

 sess this advantage, scarcely to be judged of or estimated at its proper 

 value as yet, that the fish may be able, during three-quarters of the 

 year or even the whole year round, to take food, and will omit the 

 lethargic winter-sleep conditioned by the cold winter. There is scarcely 

 a comparison to be made so far as the carp are concerned between the 

 rivers of this country, so richly supplied with food, which it will not be 

 compelled to seek for it under a constant strife for existence, and those 

 of the much poorer waters of the Rhine, Elbe, Rhone, «&c. In the 

 waters of its native country, in Central Europe, after its first wakening 

 from the long winter sleep, it seeks most diligently after the contents of 

 the seeds of the Nupliar luteum and Nympliea alba, the yellow and white 

 water-lily, the Phellandrieum aquaticum^ Festuca fiaitans, etc. The waters 

 of the United States abound in all these plants and numerous others, 

 the seeds of which will serve the fish as food ; for instance, the wild 

 rice, {Zizania aquatica and Z. Jiuitans,) the well known Tuscarora rice 

 or "water-oats" with its great riches of seeds, and many others, which 

 will yield food profusely and which European waters do not possess, 

 thus giving a great advantage to the American carp-culturist. And 

 then there is the culture of fish in ponds. There are culturists in Cen- 

 tral Europe who, wishing to see the fish growing more rapidly, take the 

 trouble to feed them with soaked barley, which they occasionally throw 

 out in different places, and l)y doing so they have had a very full success, 

 the fish growing larger, that is, more quickly, when not thus fed. By 

 introducing the above-named wild or natural water-plants in carp- 

 ponds they will be perpetuated, and the grains which have fallen to the 

 bottom of the water will form an ample article of food for the first 

 spring days, if we do not prefer to give them the almost worthless offal 

 of the slaughter-houses. I do not advocate the so-called artificial feed- 

 ing of this fish where the ponds themselves yield food in ample abund- 



