Fireflies, toe biters and the fisher

 I have complained about finding someone to give me a good haircut. I struck a note with several of my fellow bloggers! 

I was happy with this second one from the same stylist. Whew! We drove into Carleton Place, and JB shopped while I was being taken care of. 

All sorts of things are happening outdoors. I have a firefly who has had a friend join him on the trailcam! He seems to hang out here. Usually the fireflies are active mating in June. I'l bet they are early this year.

fireflies from Jennifer Jilks on Vimeo.

Belostomatidae (Wiki) AKA toe biters

I spotted the toe biters in the goldfish pond. I thought I'd fish them out and look at them more closely. They were 'all sexed up' to quote my late mother! 😏 

I left them in the heated bird bath overnight. I could have taken them down to the frog pond, but in the morning they had flown away. Yes, beetles with wings, and a mosquito/blackfly-type proboscis. 

"It has a penetrating semi-retractable proboscis. Think of it as sort of a mosquito way of feeding. It has digestive enzymes... seizes prey in its arms like a praying mantis would.... then jabs its pointy bit into the prey.. and slurps out the goop like a spider."

This first one, below, is one I found on my back deck one year, Sept. 2011. It was ~2" long. Another I found in 2014 sucking on a frog.They are bad for the goldfish and froggies. 

 

toe biters from Jennifer Jilks on Vimeo.

Down at the frog pond, a wood frog has succumbed to freeze and thaw, I think. It is a tough life. Faithful readers will know I work hard to take the goldfish pond frogs down to the frog pond (I moved 43 last fall), where the winter doesn't treat them so harshly. The wood frogs hunker down in the forest debris. 

Joseph Brian was out back with Cinnamon when he saw a fisher loping through the yard. They are notorious for killing cats, but it ignored Cinnamon, seeing JB, and headed for the back 50. 

The fisher photo is a screen capture from my video. They are quite fast. I think Cinnamon is a bit bigger than the fisher on my trailcams. He didn't show any fear for this fisher. 

The goldfishies are in!

60-gal. fish tank

Goldfish pond update:

Nov. 5th –very warm days (18 C. today Daisy and I put another 8 green frogs into the frog pond.

Oct. 22

• ~Today, removed two more, one dove deep = 22 moved to the big pond!
• ~I've removed 20, one got away on the way to the frog pond below = 19 relocated.

BTW
My contact dermatitis is still healing. Thanks those who asked. I think it was on my clothes –unworn since the cooler weather. I washed them in Ecru (from MEC), and then washed them again. Crikey, it's awful. I put on my cream, then realized the stuff on my inner arm was rubbing off on the bed sheet. Anyway, we'll see how it goes.

My fishy tale

Last winter, the small goldpond froze and thawed, froze again, and I had quite a few frog deaths in spring, as well as a few goldfish deaths -those who refused to come inside. It was gruesome and stunk so badly as I cleared it out. I couldn't get the smell out of my head for days.

Contemplating this over the summer, I figured out that when I removed the goldfish, I might as well remove the frogs and take them down to the pond. It took me hours to drain.

Daisy helper!

I had helpers. Daisy was fascinated with the frogs in the bucket.

Hubby helped, as I was hovering around the pond all afternoon, looking for rebel fish. He made two trips with a total of five frogs, talking to them all the way, assuring them that they would be happier in the big pond! It was so cute.

I removed 18 frogs, 6 still remained. Sigh.
Two toe biters, one small leech, similarly removed.
On Tuesday, I couldn't see any. I hope they abandoned ship!

Down to the pond we went. They gave a giant leap, and jumped for joy!


Back at the goldfish pond. Daisy was still looking for the frogs. Annie was supervising.


Ten fish recovered: Shirley IV (she's gone all white, tho), 5 orange/white ones, and 4 all-orange fish. Shirley is a Shubunkin, although she doesn't have the black.
I bought 3 of the orange/white fish in the spring to add to their numbers. They don't have Shirley's fancy tail. They could be Ryukin Goldfish. Who knows? Here is a list of goldfish species.
They are a hardier species than the feeder goldfish I'd had for a time. They didn't reproduce this year. I'm not sure why.

A couple of older goldfish
now gone!

I did not scream like a girl!

Daisy and I were on walkies by the pond. Sitting on our stumps, breathing in the fine, cool, crisp air, I heard something in the leaves. This poor little frog was having its blood sucked out by an incubus.

OK, it's too close to Hallowe'en. It was a massive Water beetle. You can see the size of my shoe in the 3rd photo. All I had was my videocam, and its photos aren't great, but here you are! I picked the frog up, tossed it into the pond water, after the Water beetle let go. Thankfully. It's about 3" long.

Have you seen these bugs? Beetles, I suppose. They fly. A water beetle, but they don't need to live in the water. I spotted this one, below, in September, 2011 on my 2nd story back porch. Seriously. They have quite the pinch, apparently. I chose not to touch it, bad role model for Daisy.

More info:
Raven Garfield Sculptor  Oh it absolutely preys on frogs and other critters directly!! It has a penetrating semi-retractable proboscis. Think of it as sort of a mosquito way of feeding. It has digestive enzymes... seizes prey in its arms like a praying mantis would.... then jabs its pointy bit into the prey.. and slurps out the goop like a spider.

Really, it has neat features of several other critters when you think about it! I'm a big time entomology nerd... I used to love keeping these guys in tanks. They almost invariably use their hind legs to hold on to air hoses or power cords.... rear ends with an air tube breaking the surface.. arms spread wide waiting for some wee bait fish to swim past and *WHACK!!!*. When they were done feeding you'd see these husks of wee fish.. all bent in the middle at a sharp angle where they were folded in half to be hollowed out.