Day 4: More fun stuff from the pond by my place

Tonight was an extra fun night out at the pond. After a thrilling Evolutionary Studies seminar tonight and then a trip to the brew pub (awesome root beer made on premises), I got home and just couldn't pass up another crawl around the pond in my yard. The water was down about a foot from Friday, but I still found many neat animals to examine. I started poking around near a big rock just next to shore and right next to the rock was the largest fish (~10") I saw tonight. I believe it was a pickerel as it had a fusiform body with spots along the flanks and pickerel-like head. I ran up to my car and grabbed my dip-net and tried to scoop it up, but no luck. It was there and the next instant it was gone...super fast.

I moved on down the pond and saw a number of little fish sitting on little depressions they had scoured a few cm. down into the gravel on the bottom. I scooped one or two of these guys up and I believe they are year-old black crappie (Pomoxis negromaculatus) about 2-3" long. From what I read on the net, the females lay up to 60k eggs and the males sit on the nests to protect the babies.

While I was watching the small crappie I heard an interesting frog call from around the other side of the pond and carefully stalked over to right behind the frog. The sound was much like a loud cat purr that lasted for a few seconds and ended at a different pitch then when it started, higher I think. I caught the maker of this sound and it turned out to be a Pickerel Frog (Rana palustris). This frog is often confused with the Northern Leopard Frog in our area but it is more of a brown color overall and has yellow coloring under the legs.

From here I followed the inlet stream to our pond that connect with Black Creek and noted a number of fly larvae in the water. Heaps of tiny guys that I think were mosquito larvae and then some bigger black ones that a BMI site on the web tells me is a mayfly larva (Ephemerella) of some species. I nabbed a nice picture in which you can see the tri-forked tail and the gills extended out along the body.

Perhaps the coolest creature I spotted tonight was a terrestrial flatworm that I identified as Bipalium adventitium. Turns out this species is known from across the country and a fellow at SUNY Cortland has been doing some studies on these guys. I have seen one of these only once before crawling on some rocks on a rainy day up by Catskill. You can easily see that it has a flattened head and a dark line running down the back; it was about 2" long. It is also a lighter, caramel color quite different than normal reddish-brown earthworms. All in all a high-diversity night at the pond.

List of things seen today: Woodchuck, millipede, black beetle, earthworms, flatworm, crappie (many), pickerel frog, pickerel (?), water-boatman bug, mayfly larvae, mosquito larvae (?), crows, wasp, really sweet white and brown kitty who purrs a lot named Mr. Peanut (as I write this she is licking my arm).