Small stream sampling

[TurbineBlade]

For those with interest in non-fishing aspects of local waters, I thought I'd share a quick "sample" report from the 38F water in my backyard stream.  

Winter collecting is not too different from winter fishing, in that the fish are definitely there but you need to put a bit of thought into where they might be.  In my experience they are NOT in the same places in the winter as they are in the summer, that's for sure.  

In a couple of hours I managed:

6 tesselated darters

8 blacknose dace

1-2 tiny redbreast sunfish

3 plethodontid salamanders (I can't key the non-Missouri species beyond family)

countless swallowtail shiners

cranefly larvae

chironomids

1 damselfly larva

1 fairfax county library card

(I kept a subset of the above for my 25gal cube -- acclimating from 38F to 72F takes time!)

I finally purchased the "perfect dipnet" which is pricey, but WAYYYY better than any other "self" net I've ever used for this purpose.  Usually 1-2 strong riffles will destroy a typical net.  

Fun stuff folks -- there's nothing more pro-American than keeping and appreciating our native darters.  God I miss the rainbows I could get within 1 mile of Missouri State campus.  

Gene

[TurbineBlade]

[namfos]

When that day arrives, your son will, without a doubt, enjoy "messing around in the woods" with his old man.

Mark

[TurbineBlade]

Here's hoping!  For now, we just pack him around and try to show him stuff.  I hand-caught a great leopard frog the other day (I've developed a pretty reliable technique for catching ranids) and try to show him, but he was more interested in looking at my wrist watch ;).  I need him to be upright and capable of holding either a fly rod, or the other end of a seine net at minimum. 

He mostly just smiles and drools right now ;).   

Gene

[Andrew Sarcinello]

Interesting, I've always been curious about darters. See them everywhere but never bothered to learn the different species. Aren't some of them very sensitive to water quality?

I believe your salamander there is a juvenile eastern mudpuppy (think I can see the gills, but not sure). If so, they're very common. I've only once seen an adult though, the adults are nocturnal IIRC.

[TurbineBlade]

Mudpuppys are great finds, but the lack of obvious gills, overall lack of girth, and the lack of reports of that species ranging into NOVA suggests an eastern redback salamander, but I'm not 100% sure on that.  Whatever it is, they're not hard to kick up around here!

Gene

[TurbineBlade]

Sorry -- Probably Northern two-line salamanders.  I had written off that species due to the lack of an obvious "stripe" on the individuals I was turning up.  However, they are one of the plethodontid species around here that associates with aquatic areas and lays eggs underwater (from what I gather from various VA websites).  

My guess is that these are subadults without the adult color development, but beyond (or toward then end) of their use of external gills.  

Rob?

[TurbineBlade]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northern_two-lined_salamander

[namfos]

He'll enjoy splashing soon Just wait till he's walking and babbling baby talk at a 100 miles an hour.

Mark

[Brian Cohen]

Hmm.   Can you send me the lin you are working from?

Sent from my BlackBerry 10 smartphone on the Verizon Wireless 4G LTE network.

From: namfos Sent: Sunday, March 19, 2017 11:36 To: Tidal Potomac Fly Rodders Reply To: tidal-potoma...@googlegroups.com Subject: {Tidal Potomac Fly Rodders} Re: Small stream sampling

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[Andrew Sarcinello]

Yeah if there were no gills, then I'm wrong for sure. But here's a pic I found of a juvenile that looks like what I used to catch growing up. Gills aren't obvious when they are that small. http://farm8.static.flickr.com/7337/9167454719_296ce90387.jpg

Two lined are also very common and would have been my next guess. Usually the stripes are more pronounced. Never seen redbacks along or in water before.

[Andrew Sarcinello]

Also look at the shape of the head and eyes. Two lined have eyes that stick up from the head, search Google images. The one you caught has a flat head with low set eyes. Also the tail on yours is paddle shaped (vertically), two lined have longer, narrower tails.

Were they in water when you found them or under rocks on the bank? Mudpuppies would be in water.

[TurbineBlade]

Here's another sample from the same stretch of water; this one with a slightly more defined "stripe" and a bit larger body size.  This one also gave up part of its tail at some point, which is common with this family.   

I'm about 99% sure these are Northern two-line salamanders.  

Also got this sucker under an undercut bank, about mid-way between my place and Rob's -- 

[TurbineBlade]

Search "juvenile Northern two-line" and you get some results that look a lot like the first one there.  My guess is that these others a just a bit more green.  

Gene

[Andrew Sarcinello]

Oh yeah. That one's definitely a two lined!

[Andrew Sarcinello]

Just did that search. You're right, that's exactly what the first one is. wondering now if what I used to catch were never mudpuppies to begin with but just juvies of other types.

[TurbineBlade]

Hey, live and learn -- input from other sets of eyes always helps with these things.  

A small part of me dies if I can't ID a local species, plus at least 6 other people out there were wanting to know.  Of those 6, 1 was maybe thinking about actually googling it ;).  

Andrew, with our combined skill, we can provide answers to the questions no one asked! 

Gene