The Columbian. [volume] (Bloomsburg, Pa.) 1866-1910, 1884-11-14
Breeding Carp.

German carp will grow nicely and
do well in water ponds fed only by
thunder showers and the melting #
winter SHOWS. There is not a single
farm in Ohio but what can have q
carp pond at less cost than a common
sized bulldog, and furnish far better
food, and if you are not able to have
both, massacre the "purp," but make
the pond in July or August. If you
have a ravne on the farm where water
can be easily damned, so much the
better, but if you have perfectly level
land with clay subsoil, you can
scrape out good, large, deep hole, al
lowing the dirt to form a dam all
around the pond so the water will be
four or five feet deep, and then plant
yellow willows around the edge of the
pond to shade the water little, also to
prevent the bank from crumbling
down, and as soon as the fall rains
come on the job is done and you can
plant the fish.
If you have natural ravne where
water flows freely during rain storms
or where partially fed by spring water,
it is a better place; then if you are
poor and unable to build an expensive
dam, you can haul logs of any size or
kind to make log-pile that will fill
the ravine for foundation. Chink up
between the logs with fine brush or
straw, and then for final finish plow
and scrape the land inside the pond to
any desired size or shape you please,
only finish it handy for using seine
to catch the fish. Scrape all the dirt
upon the logs inside the pond first,
then dump it over on the lower side
of the dam last, to have both sides the
same finish, and muskrats will then
travel over the dam instead of through
it. In no other way can you keep
them from spelling mud dam.
In the center of the dam, or where
you wish the water-how, leave the top
log of the dam bare, enough in length
to make all the flow that can ever be
necessary then on the lower side of
the dam build an inclined plane of
plank fully twelve to fifteen feet long,
letting the plank run from the ground
np to and be spiked to the top log of
the dam. The water can then run
over the dam and not wash away the
lower side of it, and if a good stone
pile is placed upon the bottom of the
plank it will not wash out deep hole.
The rats will then walk over these
planks into the pond, but if you leave
a space under them, the internal
scamps will bore hole through it, il
il is a hundred feet or more through it
Plant willows all over the dam they
will soon root and grow into dense
mass of bushes and leaves, furnishing
some shade for the fish aud making {
dam that win last forever. As soon a'
the fail rains come on your pond i,
ready for the fish. l built pont
three or four years ago to furnish va
ter in dry time for the steam boiler
!, in our mills. had no thought of {
carp pond, but did happen to make i
so it answers very nice purpose 70
=, both the water reservoir and fish pom :
1t is five feet deep in the center of th
pond and covers about half an acre o
. land, Eighteen months ago l pu
:, twenty carp in the pond, received frou
k our national fish hatchery in Washing
ton, free, by express, none of them a
large as my finger, and now we hav
thousands of them, all sizes, up to pei
II haps one pound, We have never fe
% them anything until about two week
ago, We hauled gravel from a cree
near by and made a nice bed to fee
them on, aud now we feed some vast
food from the kitchen. We sha
,e catch ours mostly with a seine, the
confne what we wish in water-boXC
in the pond where we can get thel
handy, unless we desire some RAJ
sport, when we will procure plenty
angle worms, hook and line, 90 dow
Ii TO the pond and sit in the hot sun, sp
on the bait, fight mosquitoes and cate
er fish. Oh, it's fun But you finish II
TX pond and the children will do the re
~ of the business. Cor. Ohio F'drmt