Common Carp Farming: A Production Guide

How common carp (Cyprinus carpio) is farmed: biology and hardiness, pond culture and polyculture, fertilization, induced spawning and seed supply, growth to market and main diseases.

Overview

Common carp (Cyprinus carpio) is one of the oldest and most widely farmed food fish, cultured for centuries in both Asia and Europe. Native to Europe and Asia, it has been introduced almost worldwide and is among the most frequently introduced fish species. Global aquaculture production is in the multi-million-tonne range, on the order of 4 million tonnes a year, with China the dominant producer.

Biology and hardiness

Common carp is a hardy, omnivorous, bottom-feeding member of the family Cyprinidae. It scavenges insects, crustaceans, molluscs, worms and plant material from the bottom, feeding most intensively at night and around dawn. It tolerates a very wide temperature range, with reported survival from about 3 to 35 °C and optimal growth around 23 to 30 °C, and it withstands low dissolved oxygen, even surviving winter under ice. This tolerance makes it well suited to low-input pond culture.

Pond culture and polyculture

Common carp is grown mainly in earthen ponds, often as part of a polyculture. Because different carps feed in different niches, combining them uses the pond more fully: common carp feeds on the bottom, silver carp filters phytoplankton, bighead carp filters zooplankton, and grass carp eats vegetation. FAO notes economically viable combinations such as common carp with silver carp and silver carp with bighead carp, and in South Asia carp polyculture is combined with Indian major carps such as catla and rohu.

Fertilization and feeding

In semi-intensive pond culture, the pond is fertilized with organic or inorganic fertilizer to raise the natural food supply of plankton and bottom organisms, which the carp graze. Supplemental feeds such as cereals, by-products and formulated pellets are added as the standing crop grows. In intensive systems, complete pelleted diets are used and stocking and feeding are increased accordingly.

Induced spawning and seed supply

Common carp can spawn naturally on submerged vegetation when water warms, with spawning beginning around 17 to 20 °C, but hatcheries widely use induced spawning (hypophysation) to control reproduction and produce large numbers of fry on schedule. Eggs are incubated and fry are raised through nursery ponds to fingerling size before stocking into grow-out ponds.

Main diseases

Important viral diseases of farmed carp include koi herpesvirus disease (KHV), which causes high mortality, and spring viraemia of carp (SVC), a notifiable disease that strikes in cool spring water. Bacterial infections such as aeromonad disease (sometimes called dropsy) also occur, particularly in stressed or crowded fish. Biosecurity and avoiding the movement of infected stock are central to disease control.