Not furry, but we like them anyway.
Common Carp
Cyprinus carpio
Also called European carp, Eurasian carp, Carp, Mirror carp (scale form), Leather carp (scale form)
From Native to Europe and Asia, especially the Danube and Volga basins and the Black, Caspian and Aral Sea basins. Domesticated as a food fish by the Romans and later spread by medieval monks.12
At a glance the quick version
Looks how to spot one
Scaled, robust cyprinid (fully scaled, mirror, linear or leather forms)
A heavy, powerful fish with a long dorsal fin, a downward-facing mouth and two pairs of barbels. The fully scaled form has large shiny scales, while mirror carp carry a few big mirror-like scales, linear mirrors have a single row along the side and leather carp are almost scaleless.1
Personality what they are like
Peaceful and sociable. Carp are curious foragers that spend much of their time rooting along the bottom.1
Daily activity how busy a day looks
Active, especially at dusk, dawn and night, and constantly forages through soft sediment. It needs a lot of room to swim and grow.12
Grooming and care the hands-on bits
Copes with a wide range of conditions: about 3 to 35 C (best 23 to 30 C) and pH 6.5 to 9.0. A large, well-filtered pond keeps the water clear despite its digging.12
Home where they are happiest
A large pond or lake with soft bottom and plants. FishBase advises against home aquariums, saying a tank over 2 m long would be needed for a group. Pond carp should never be released into the wild.21
Food basics what goes in the bowl
An omnivore that sifts the bottom for insect larvae, worms, crustaceans and molluscs and also eats plants and seeds. Pond fish take sinking carp or koi pellets.12
Company who they like around
The story where it all began
Romans kept carp in purpose-built ponds about 2000 years ago, and between the 13th and 16th centuries monks spread carp farming across Europe. In East Asia carp were farmed from early times too, and Japanese breeders later developed the coloured carp that became koi.1
Fun facts for the dinner table
- 1
The carp has no stomach and crushes its food with throat teeth.1
- 2
A single female can lay over a million eggs in one season.2
- 3
The heaviest recorded common carp weighed 45.59 kg and was caught in France in 2013.1
- 4
Carp can cope with low oxygen by gulping air at the surface.1
- 5
Some fertilised carp eggs can survive passing through a bird's gut, a way of reaching new waters shown in 2020.1
Recognised by the official bits
- IUCN Red List
- Wild species assessed as Least Concern (2022)2
The care rhythm Furry Diary remembers it for you
A typical home-care rhythm for a Common Carp. It is our own starting plan, not a vet's advice, and you can change every line in the app.
- FeedingOnly in the warm seasonevery day
- Pond checkevery day
- Water testevery 2 weeks
- Filter cleanevery month
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Where this comes from
Every breed page shows where each fact comes from. If we got something wrong, sorry, we are pet people, not a science magazine. Tell us at [email protected] and we will fix it.
- Wikipedia: Common carp en.wikipedia.orgused for names, range, history, body, scale forms, colours, size, record, lifespan, water parameters, diet, behaviour, fun facts
- FishBase: Cyprinus carpio fishbase.seused for max length and weight, max age, temperature, pH, diet, activity, aquarium note, IUCN status, spawning
Checked 2026-09-30. Text is written in our own words from these sources.