Saturday, May 23, 2009

Caddisfly Larvae Sighting

This morning I was happy to notice a couple tiny (1 1/2 - 2") fish swimming in the stream!  Then I noticed several caddis fly larvae slowly meandering along the stream bed.  That is exciting, because my understanding is that they can be a sign of healthy water.  Here are a few pictures of some of the little critters (I apologize for the quality of the photos.  It would be helpful to have a fancier digital camera with a polarizing lens.  I took these zoomed in as close as I could + I used the digital zoom setting.  That doesn't make for high quality) - 








I was happy to get two together in one shot here



Here is a link to a great web page about the caddisfly - 





I had to take a picture of a good old water skeeter, too.  Don't they make the coolest shadow?  There are quite a few of them on the surface of the stream during the spring, summer and fall.




And here's a picture looking at the back/southern part of "our" stretch of stream - 



It's looking mighty green around here now!  I need to do a little weeding along the stream bed on the side that we planted.  I think I'll do a little weed research and post what I find on here one of these days....

1 comment:

  1. This is a beautiful post--even though the image quality is not super fine ;-)
    When I put a pond in my yard, I had this multi-year learning experience wherein I got to see the building blocks of a healthy micro-system be put in place by nature. For me, my giant learning and awe-inspiring experience was learning about dragonfly nymphs. I now know that if there are mosquito larvae in water, there are either no dragonflies willing to breed there, of there aren't enough.
    Healthy water does indeed equal life. I really like this site, thanks for putting it up!

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