1912 AND FISHERIES COMMISSION. 81 



appears good to it as food, and it will grub and burrow in the mud, 

 digging up the vegetation in search of roots or, perhaps, various forms 

 of animal life. It is a hardy fisih, as evidenced by the varying conditions 

 and temperatures to which it will adapt itself. Indeed, instances have 

 been known where the fish has been frozen stiff for considerable periods 

 and resuscitated when thawed out, while in Germany, where the fish is 

 much appreciated and its consumption is general, it is frequently packed 

 for tihe market in wet moss and under these conditions remains alive 

 for no little time. It is recorded also that tjie top layers of these fish, 

 when packed on ice and shipped by freight from Ohio to New York, are 

 frequently found to be alive on reaching the market. 



It is held by some that the carp will live to an extraordinary age, 

 100 to 150 years, and attain a weight of from 80 to 90 lbs., and although 

 there appears to be little reliable evidence as to the correctness of these 

 statements, at least it is certain that under favourable conditions the fish 

 will live a great many years and attain a very considerable Aveight, 

 specimens well over 20 lbs. having already been caught on this conti- 

 nent. 



The carp, which commences to breed, apparently, in its third year, 

 is remarkably prolific, as evidenced by the fact that one reliable 

 authority has placed the average number of eggs of a 4 to 5 lb. fish at 

 400,000 to 500,000, while other instances are recorded of larger fish con- 

 taining egigs to a number exceeding two millions. It is a school breeder, 

 however, and particularly careless in the matter of its eggs, which are 

 scattered over the vegetation in the shallow waters and left to take care 

 of themselves without any further precaution on the part of the fish. 

 To tliis fact may, perhaps, be attributed in part the abnormal increase 

 in the carp in the waters of this continent, for the habitual enemies of 

 spawn would not have been seeking for it in the open places in which 

 it is left by tliis imported fish, and thus an abnormal percentage of eggs 

 would have been successfully hatched. This, however, would in the 

 course of time adjust itself, as sooner or later the spaw^n eaters will 

 become aware of the new location of desirable food, and doubtless this 

 will act as a check to a further proportionate increase as compared with 

 that of the past thirty years. 



In regard to Provincial waters it may, generally speaking, be said 

 that the carp prefers the warmer waters to the colder, amd, as it is a 

 fisli that habitually lives in shallow water, the great lakes, with the 

 exception of I>ake Erie, are not particularly adapted to its life. Conse- 

 quently it is unlikely that it will appear in other waters of the great lakes 

 in such (inantities as in l^ake Erie, although it nuiy be expected to work 

 its way up many of the rivers, in fact it has already done so, and, finding 

 lakes or localities favourable to its existence, rapidly multiply therein. 

 A well-known in8tan<-e of this is furnished by Lake Simcoe, where the 

 cai*p have firmly established themselves and appear to be very rapidly 

 inereasinsr. 



