Question
we have about 35-40 baby fish in our pond, they are all dark brown to black ranging in size from 1/4 inch to 11/2 inch. how can we tell what breed they are ? in our pond we have goldfish, koi,rudd,tench,carp

Answer
They are most likely goldfish.  Baby goldfish stay brown/gray/blah until they are about an inch long but some can remain that way longer or even always.  While goldfish slowly gain color, koi normally have color as soon as you can consider them "real" fish (meaning active and easy to see).  Carp are very similar to koi.  Koi are carp but there are other carp species.  I've never seen rudd or tench here in the USA (you must be in the UK) so I don't know much about them.  Do you have the orange morphs or the regularly colored rudd and tench.  If orange, the babies would be orange.  No one has ever reported rudd or tench spawnings to me but I suspect it's possible.  I would still think the babies are most likely goldfish because they spawn so readily.  Good luck!

Robyn
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