''Cyprinus rubrofuscus'', the Amur carp, is a species of cyprinid fish, and is the wild form of the well-known koi. It is widespread in the

fresh water Fresh water or freshwater is any naturally occurring liquid or frozen water containing low concentrations of dissolved salts and other total dissolved solids. Although the term specifically excludes seawater and brackish water, it does include ...

s of

eastern Asia East Asia is the eastern region of Asia, which is defined in both Geography, geographical and culture, ethno-cultural terms. The modern State (polity), states of East Asia include China, Japan, Mongolia, North Korea, South Korea, and Taiwan. ...

, native to

China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's most populous country, with a population exceeding 1.4 billion, slightly ahead of India. China spans the equivalent of five time zones and ...

, Vietnam and

Laos Laos (, ''Lāo'' )), officially the Lao People's Democratic Republic ( Lao: ສາທາລະນະລັດ ປະຊາທິປະໄຕ ປະຊາຊົນລາວ, French: République démocratique populaire lao), is a socialist ...

from the Amur to Red River basins, and has also been introduced outside its native range. It is known for its muddy flavor and boniness, hence, it is not commonly eaten by locals except when

stew A stew is a combination of solid food ingredients that have been cooked in liquid and served in the resultant gravy. A stew needs to have raw ingredients added to the gravy. Ingredients in a stew can include any combination of vegetables and ...

ed. In the past, it was considered a

subspecies In biological classification, subspecies is a rank below species, used for populations that live in different areas and vary in size, shape, or other physical characteristics (morphology), but that can successfully interbreed. Not all species ...

of the common (or European) carp, often under the scientific name ''C. carpio haematopterus'' (a

synonym A synonym is a word, morpheme, or phrase that means exactly or nearly the same as another word, morpheme, or phrase in a given language. For example, in the English language, the words ''begin'', ''start'', ''commence'', and ''initiate'' are all ...

), but the two differ in geneticsZhou, J., Wu, Q., Wang, Z. and Ye, Y. (2004). Molecular Phylogenetics of Three Subspecies of Common carp Cyprinus Carpio, based on sequence analysis of cytochrome b and control region of mtDNA. Journal of Zoological Systematics and Evolutionary Research 42(4): 266–269. and meristics, leading recent authorities to recognize them as separate species. Although earlier studies also have found minor differences between northern ("''haematopterus''") and southern ("''viridiviolaceus''") populations in Eastern Asia in both meristics and genetics, later studies have found that they are not

monophyletic In cladistics for a group of organisms, monophyly is the condition of being a clade—that is, a group of taxa composed only of a common ancestor (or more precisely an ancestral population) and all of its lineal descendants. Monophyletic gro ...

.Wang, C., Liu, H., Liu, Z., Wang, J., Zou, J., and Li, X. (2010). Mitochondrial genetic diversity and gene flow of common carp from main river drainages in China. Freshwater Biology 55(9): 1905–1915. However, any phylogenetic structure is difficult to establish because of widespread translocations of carp between different regions. The parent species of the domesticated koi carp is an East Asian carp, possibly ''C. rubrofuscus'' (not ''C. carpio'').Craig, J.F., eds. (2015). Freshwater Fisheries Ecology. p. 297. Wiley-Blackwell. .

References

Cyprinus Freshwater fish of China Fish of East Asia Freshwater fish of Asia Taxa named by Bernard Germain de Lacépède Fish described in 1803 {{Cyprininae-stub