Estimating the Densities of Common Carp and Their Biomass-Dependent Effects on Ponds

	Texas Chapter of the American Fisheries Society

From the 2000 Joint Meeting of the Arkansas, Louisiana, and Texas Chapters of the American Fisheries Society held in Bossier City, Louisiana.

Estimating the Densities of Common Carp and Their Biomass-Dependent Effects on Ponds

Drenner, R. W., J. L. Smith, S. Mann, M. Chumchal, J. Fennell, W. H. Nowlin and C. M. Edwards, Department of Biology, Texas Christian University, Fort Worth, Texas 76129, USA

We conducted two studies at the Eagle Mountain Fish Hatchery, Ft. Worth, TX to examine: (1) the use of electrofishing catch-per-effort (CPE) to estimate population densities of common carp (Cyprinus carpio), and (2) the biomass-dependent effects of carp on water quality. The first study involved May-July night-time electrofishing of 18 ponds with carp densities
ranging from 6 to 507 carp/ha. Carp density was a statistically significant linear function of electrofishing CPE (P< 0.01, r² = 0.43). The second study involved May-June sampling of water quality variables in 11 ponds with carp biomass ranging from 0 to 466 kg/ha. Chlorophyll a and total phosphorus increased as significant linear functions of carp biomass (P < 0.05, r² = 0.38, 0.39, respectively).

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