1887 



GLEANINGS IN IJEE CULTURE. 



777 



the inlet at B. A heavy rain washes away 

 entirely this little mud dam made with the 

 hands, while it suffices, during a light show- 

 er, to turn all the water into the inlet at B. 

 Lest you m;iy not get exactly the idea of 

 this inlet at B, T will make it a little plainer 

 in Fig. L'. The arrows sliow the water-conrse. 



Fig. 2. 



Wasto-watcr \ Hill. 

 Ihannel, \ 



Channel, 

 oaiTied aloiig\ 

 the hillsiiif. \ 



\ 



DIAGRA3I OF INLKT AND AVASTE-WATEU 

 PASSAGE, 



You will observe, that by watching your 

 grounds for a convenient spot you have 

 nothing to do but to dam across from one 

 projecting point on the hillside to another 

 on the opposite hillside, the deepest place 

 being right at the outlet of the pond at C 

 The height of the dam ought to be so as to 

 give three or four feet of water in this deep- 

 est portion in the winter time. Carp are 

 often wintered, however, in less than two 

 feet of water ; and during the coldest weath- 

 er of last winter (188(J-'7) our own pond did 

 not have more than 18 inches of water, and 

 no fish were lost. It is probable, however, 

 that circumstances were unusually favor- 

 able; for during the previous winter we 

 found, floating on the water, when the ice 

 thawed off, forty or fifty great big fish, each 

 weighing a pound or two. T would suggest, 



therefore, that the pond where your fish are 

 to be wintered have at least a small spot not 

 less tlian thi-ee feet deep. If this spot has 

 an accumulation of soft mud in which they 

 can bunow, it would probably be all the 

 better. 



When I commenced asking about the out- 

 let, friend White remarked : 



" Oh ! yes, Mr. Root, that is what I want- 

 ed to tell you about. The books and papers 

 talk about a complicated arrangement that 

 haidly anybody can understand, and I puz- 

 zled over their diagrams a good while, and 

 then made an arrangement of my own. See 

 here." 



While" speaking, friend White uncovered 

 a sort of box, or chimney, right in the mid- 

 dle of the dam, just over the outlet ; and in 

 order to make it plain I think I shall have to 

 use another diagram. This diagram repre- 

 sents a cross-section of the dam, running 

 through it at right angles, just where the 

 outlet comes. 



You will notice in the diagram below, the 

 arrangement is such that all water that gets 

 out of the pond comes out from the lowest 

 point in the pond. There are many reasons 

 why this is preferable to letting the pond 

 overflow at the top of the dam. First, we 

 need to make every effort possible to keep 

 the water in the pond warm ; in fact, it can 

 not be too warm to have the fish make a 

 rapid growth, and therefore we can by no 

 means allow the surface water, after it is 

 warmed up by the sun, to pass off over the 

 dam in the way the waste water usually 

 comes off from ponds. Another thing : 

 AVhen water is stirred up, the muddy part 

 always settles down to the lowest point ; 

 and if no provision were made for removing 

 the accumulation at this lowest point, the 

 pond would soon become filled up with 

 mud, and we should have no pond at all. 

 This often happens in ordinary ponds across 

 a stream fed by surplus water from rains. 



^\Lid to Cliimtity. 



DIAGRAM OF OUTLET AND OVERFLOW 



