Also known as
- Bai Lian CN
- Amur Blanco AR
- Amour Blanc FR
- White Amur US
- Ctenopharyngodon US
Identification
A heavy fusiform freshwater specialist built for sustained pulling in current. Strict vegetarian — yet hard-pulling, dogged, and deep when hooked. Found across stocked reservoirs, irrigation canals, and slow rivers globally.
- Dark olive to brownish-gold back grading to golden-bronze flanks and a white-yellow belly
- Very large thick scales with dark edges creating a cross-hatched pattern
- Large scaleless head with a wide forward-facing mouth
- Pharyngeal grinding plates in the throat for processing vegetation — no biting teeth
Where it holds
- Rivers
- Lakes
Behaviour
A strict obligate herbivore — algae, soft submerged macrophytes (Hydrilla, Elodea, milfoil), and emergent grasses are the entire diet. Eats 40-100% of body weight per day in optimal conditions. Daytime grazers with peak feeding 18-28°C (64-82°F); activity drops sharply below 15°C (59°F) and stops below 10°C (50°F). Notoriously line-shy and cautious — will mouth and reject any bait offering resistance. Pre-baiting cut grass, sweetcorn, or bread mash 24-48 hours into a swim transforms catch rates.
Diet: Aquatic Plants, Algae, Grasses, Aquatic Macrophytes, Terrestrial Vegetation
How it's caught
Line Fishing
Bottom Fishing
The dominant method. Hair-rigged sweetcorn, bread paste, or plant-based boilies on a size 4-8 hook with a light bolt rig (40-60g lead) — heavier leads spook line-shy fish. Pre-bait the swim with cut grass clippings, sweetcorn, or bread mash 24-48 hours ahead. Fish margins, weed-bed edges, and shallow reedy bays in 1-3m. Sensitive bite alarms or quivertips essential — takes are tentative.
Float Fishing
Free-line or near-weightless float-rig fresh sweetcorn, bread crust, or floating grass clippings into shallow margins where fish are visible mudding or surface-grazing. Tiny shot pinched well above a long fluorocarbon hook length — minimum resistance is everything for cautious takes. Slow, deliberate float drift through reedbed gaps and lily-pad channels produces best.
Fly Fishing
Dry Fly
Cast foam bread, foam grass-blade, and floating-pellet patterns to surface-cruising or visibly-feeding fish in shallow vegetated bays. Long fluorocarbon tippet, dead-still presentation; let the fish approach and clearly turn down with the fly before setting. The most aesthetic method and a serious challenge in clear NA reservoir water — natural pattern-and-colour matching outproduces attractor flies.
Bow Fishing
Stalk shallow vegetation-grazing fish from a shallow-draft boat or by wading clear shallows. Aim 15-30cm low for refraction; effective range 4-7m. Night shooting under high-output LED lights extends the productive window. Used heavily in North American reservoirs where grass carp are managed as introduced biological-control fish under harvest-encouraged tags.
