328 Roosevelt Wild Life Annals 



criticism of the fish for table use has been due to those who have eaten it too soon 

 after the spawning season, and to improper preparation, inckiding bad cooking. 

 He advocates keeping the fish for a week in pure water, in tubs, changing it daily, 

 as a part of the preparation for cooking. This removes the muddy taste (Cole, 

 '05, p. 604). Evermann and Clark ('20, p. 341) consider the flesh of Carp sweet, 

 better than that of the Large-mouth Black Bass, and recommend using fish weigh- 

 ing from five to eight pounds, which are better than the larger ones. Hankinson 

 has seen Carp left on the shore of Cayuga Lake, by fishermen in winter. Here 

 they would freeze and finally decay. Some of them when first dumped from nets 

 on the shore were cooked by Hankinson and found to be good. 



If people could be taught to prepare the Carp properly at the proper season, 

 its use as food would very likely become much greater. It might even become so 

 extensively sought that the present superabundance of this fish in our inland waters 

 would be much reduced. The Carp, which has been called "the English Sparrow 

 of our waters" (Cole, '05, p. 636), is clearly an undeveloped resource (I.e., p. 637) 

 in this country. It is especially valuable because it makes aquatic plants indirectly 

 available as food for man (Leach, '19, p. 18; Taylor, '17, p. 4). 



Carp are known to interfere with other and more useful fish when abundantly 

 associated with them, but there is considerable difference of opinion as to the 

 destructiveness of the Carp in this way; and it is a proper subject for further 

 investigations. Carp are destructive to shallow water vegetation and, in rooting 

 about water plants, undoubtedly may interfere with the nesting of bass, sunfish 

 and other fish that breed about these plants. Titcomb ('23, p. 20) found Carp 

 destructive to vegetation in bass ponds. He placed several in a part of a pond 

 where there were growing Ccratophyllum, Philotria, Potamogcton, Vallisneria, and 

 Nymphaea. When the water was drawn in the fall, this part of the pond, which 

 had been partitioned oflf for the experiment, was found to be absolutely destitute 

 of any kind of vegetation ; and the following season, when the Carp were excluded, 

 the plants became as abundant as formerly. Embody ('22, p. 16) considers it 

 destructive to spawning grounds of other and better fish, through its uprooting 

 of aquatic plants. Cole ('05, p. 593) discusses its destructiveness to plant life by 

 making the water roily through its rooting activities, and it seems to him probable 

 that plant growth may be greatly reduced by this roiliness. 



In destroying vegetation. Carp not only interfere with other fish but do damage 

 in other ways. They have been accused of reducing feeding areas for wild fowl 

 and hence of interfering with the interests of the sportsmen. Cole ('05, p. 587) 

 who has carefully investigated this charge gives instances where the introduction 

 (if Carp in certain waters has been followed by a decreased production of wild 

 celery and other plants serving as duck food ; and this decrease was accompanied 

 by a growing scarcity of ducks. He concludes (I.e., p. 592) therefore that the 

 Carp are probably responsible for the great reduction noted of wild celery and 

 wild rice, and this in turn has deprived tlie ducks, especially the Canvasback and 

 the Redhead, of an important fdud snpi)ly, which has influenced their abundance 

 in certain localities. But he does not consider the Carp the cause of a general 

 decrease of these game Ijirds. He also notes (I.e., p. 635) that "In most cases 

 the reported damage has been either greatly exaggerated or is entirely unfounded." 



