Should You Use Grass Carp For Aquatic Plant Control?
Controlling the aquatic plants in a pond, or in any body of water is quite important. Why you say? Simple, because for whatever reason, you’ve decided that you do not want it there. Whether those plants have create some type of hindrance for swimmers, or have have clogged up the engine on your favorite boat, you want them gone, and there are many ways of doing it.
Of course you could use chemical substances, plastic lining, freezing, manual pulling them up, or even dye, however those are fairly inconvenient, and there’s no promise that your pond, or even the fish, would ever be anywhere near what it was after such an effort. Therefore it’s time to look into alternative methods—methods that won’t break your back OR your pond.
Around 1963, a brand new fish was introduced in to the U.S. ecological, and that fish was known as the Grass Carp. This fish was deliberately introduced into our ecosystem for one reason of eradicating aquatic plants, and so far it has done a great job. Here in the US, the Grass Carp is commonly called the White Amur, probably because of the fact that the phrase Carp has derogatory interpretations here in the U.S., and the name “Amur” is a reference to the river that the fish originates from, the river which borders China and Russia.
The Grass Carp, is what is known as an intrusive species, meaning that it’ll reproduce and take over any ecosystem that it is introduced in (similar to humans), however science has come far, and while it took a lot of time, as well as lots of gene manipulation, sterilizing the Grass Carp finally became standard procedure all over the world so that the integration doesn’t harm or eradicate the ecosystem.
Another thing to take into account, is the fact that the Grass Carp does not consume every kind of grass, naturally it loves plants, and would consume most of it, but just like humans, there’s items which it enjoys more than others. A couple of the things which the Grass Carp does enjoy, are:
Coontail
Spikerush
Smartweed
Bladderwort
Bulrush
Water hyssop
Eelgrass
There are many additional grasses, and a quick trip to a library, a web query, or a consultation with an expert will immediately reveal what the grass carp would consume.
When purchased in bulk, Grass Carp is pretty inexpensive, at about $10-20 per fish, and that is very reasonable when you consider how long it’ll last; living for about 10-11 years.
In certain states, you will be required to get a license before you place Grass Carp into any body of water, even if it is owned by you. To find out if that’s necessary, speak with the game warden in your area, or just check the regulations of your state, since this info is freely available to any person that needs it.
Clearly, Grass Carp are an excellent alternate means to utilizing chemicals, or lining the pond with plastic, because not just are they perfect for getting rid of undesired plants, you should also remember that this is a symbiotic relationship, you provide something they want, and in return they give a service to you, preventing you from having to do this on your own. All in all, this is a great deal.
This entry was posted on Saturday, October 31st, 2009 at 4:08 am and is filed under General. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.