12 FISH CULTURAL ASSOCIATION. 
a 
around after eating. Then suddenly you would see a fine carp 
turn over on its side and, as if attracted by magnetism, come to 
the under part of the ice and there stick fast. I extricated some 
few, which you will see on exhibition in the market, with my 
other fish on Mr. Blackford’s stand. I could have saved more 
of them, but, to use an old fisherman’s phrase, I could not see 
the point of wasting a mackerel to catch a sprat. Now, gentle- 
men, I am inclined to think that a carp pond should be at least 
four feet deep, with a foot of soft bottom, making in all five feet. 
I say this only for our Northern waters, and would not recom- 
mend feeding in the months of December, January and February, 
as I think the fish I have mentioned would have gone in the mud 
and be safe now had I not giventhem the habit of being fed in 
frosty weather. They area fish that I can assure you will with- 
stand any amount of handling in moderate weather, and live 
longer out of water than any other fish I have ever handled. 
Some time ago I took an eighteen-months-old carp from my 
pond—its weight was about two pounds—folded it in a piece of 
wet bagging, brought it to my home, No. 288 Fulton street, a 
distance of four miles, and laid it on a slab while I partook of 
dinner. I then started with it for New York, and arrived at Mr. 
Blackford’s stand two hours and thirty minutes from the time the 
fish was taken from the pond. I placed the fish in one of the 
tanks, and in presence of many of the market men the carp 
swam off as if it had only been changed from one tank to an- 
other. There was no swooning nor cause for resuscitating. I 
would still further inform those who may have carp in their 
ponds, not to be astonished if, after placing them in one pond, at 
the lapse of a month or two they find them in an adjacent one 
having no seeming connection with the first. The fact is, the 
carp will jump three feet, and then like an eel wriggle its way 
over damp grass, and make its way to other waters. This has 
been my experience, and having had, previous to its introduction 
from Germany by Prof. S. F. Baird, but very little knowledge of 
the fish. I suppose some of my associates in this body are still 
in the same position of uncertainty in regard to the carp as I 
was in previous to my personal investigation. 
& & 
