Carps and minnows
Rohu, catla, mrigal, mahseer, koi, goldfish and barbs. 21 fish on EveryFish so far.
Carps and minnows belong to the order Cypriniformes, which with more than 4,000 species is the largest group of freshwater fish. They have no teeth in their jaws, grinding food with throat teeth instead, and many have barbels and a link between the swim bladder and the ear that gives them keen hearing. The group runs from tiny danios and rasboras to the mahseer and the big carps of Asian rivers.
The world's most farmed fish
Carps are the backbone of fish farming. Grass carp, silver carp, common carp and bighead carp are among the most farmed fish on Earth by weight, mainly in China. In India and Bangladesh the Indian major carps, catla, rohu and mrigal, are raised together in ponds in composite fish culture, with each species feeding at a different depth. Carps are central to Bengali, Odia and Assamese cooking, where rohu is the everyday fish and a fish of ceremony.
Goldfish, koi and mahseer
Goldfish were bred in China from a wild carp more than a thousand years ago, and koi were bred from the common carp in Japan from the 19th century. The zebrafish, a small danio of South Asian rivers, is one of the most studied animals in biology. In the wild, the mahseers of the Himalaya and the Western Ghats are prized by anglers and revered at temple pools, but several are endangered by dams, pollution and overfishing. The common carp, in turn, is invasive in Australia and North America.
Famous carp fish
Still to be written: Catla, Cirrhinus mrigala, Common carp, Grass carp, Goldfish.
Further reading
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