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to have nets placed at certain distances in the connecting 

 channel or ditch between the ponds, so that you can take 

 and select the finest, which are the healthiest, for the stock, 

 and by so doing prevent the principal of the brood from 

 escaping to the next pond. 



There are two species of weeds which are requisite in 

 your ponds, and on which carp and tench spawn ; the one 

 is Potamogeton natans, or broad-leaved pond-weed, some- 

 times called tench-weed; the other is Ranunculus aquatilis 

 or water crow-foot. Against the former, during the period 

 of casting their spawn, they rub themselves, either from an 

 exciting or soothing cause, but they invariably discharge 

 the ova on the crow-foot, which is a long wiry weed, form- 

 ing at intervals circles of fine leaves : from its tough- 

 ness and close foliage it protects the spawn and young fry 

 from the attacks of fish of prey. I think it is by means 

 of this weed that wild fowl convey different species of fish 

 from one pond to another, in consequence of the gelatinous 

 nature of the ova causing them to adhere to the feathers 

 of the fish while feeding, and this will account for fish 

 being found in waters where none of the sort had been 

 stored. Wild fowl are particularly fond of spawn ; they 

 destroy much of it, and seek the weeds encumbered with 

 it. It is among these weeds that the fry are partially 

 protected when they emerge from the ova ; for like every 

 thing produced from creation's lot, in the early stage of life 



