One of my favorite hobbies EVER is bug catching. Why? Well,
it all started one sweltering hot day in the middle of summer. My brother and I
were trapped at a family friend’s house while Mom and Dad cut flowers. We were
to be there a good part of the day, nearly every day of summer, and we had
absolutely nothing to do. We were sitting by the “slough,” (it was really more
of a big wide ditch that ran through the property, but that was what we called It.)
when Jasper (my brother) spied a discarded salsa container. It was nothing much,
but we were desperate, so we stuck an old feather in the middle and called it a
boat. We spent about an hour floating it around, until we had to go to the van
to eat lunch. When we got back, there was no sign of our toy. We thought it was
gone for good, until Jasper saw the tip of a feather sticking out of the water
at the very edge of the ditch. We pulled up the feather and the boat with it,
but we soon discovered that it had a passenger. At first we thought it was a slug,
but then it stretched itself out, and we realized that it was actually a leech.
We had never seen one in real life and were fascinated. We filled up an old
bucket with some water, pulled up some pondweed, and transferred our pet to his
new home. We fondly named him Frank, and decided that if there was one leech in
the slough, there ought to be more. We tied a piece of twine to our salsa
container and, holding onto the string, tossed it into the water. We tied the
twine to an old stick and left. The next day, we came back to find that another
leech had anchored himself to the piece of plastic. So from then on, that became
our leech trap. We soon discovered that there were small aquatic beetles that
lived in the ditch, and spent our next few days scooping plastic containers
through the murky water, trying to catch the little bugs that so easily evaded
us. At some point or another, the nice
old lady who was renting us the property gifted Jasper and I each a butterfly
net. We were overjoyed, and from that day on, we spent every hour of our day
catching water insects, leeches - and… surprise! Tadpoles. We spent all of our
time at home researching these creatures, and soon realized that the depths of
that murky brown water were teeming with life. There were diving beetle larvae,
rat-tailed maggots, daphnia, fairy shrimp, and much, much more. Thus was the
birth of a wonderful, wonderful hobby. After a year or so, we left the property…
and the slough… for good. Jasper and I were disappointed, until a leisurely
walk through the back field revealed many ponds and puddles that contained the
same creatures as our beloved slough. We now collect these, and many of them-
at least during the winter, are fed to our fish. So, here's what happens on an average bug-catching trip.
 |
| Here, Jasper is looking out at the puddle- or rather.. pond. |
 |
| A better view |
 |
| This is it from the other side |
 |
| Jasper, sweeping his net through the water |
 |
| This may not look like much, but it contains daphnia, fairy shrimp, two small water beetles, midge larvae, and much, much more. |
 |
| We place the daphnia and fairy shrimp in this jar of fresh water until it goes to the fish |
Here are the tanks in which the "fish food" will be going:
 |
| Jasper's 20 gallon Tropical Community |
 |
| My 10 gallon divided Betta tank |
 |
| My 3 gallon Betta tank |
 |
| 4 gallon goldfish quarantine tank |
Of course, I could not write a blog post about aquatic things without first introducing you to my fish...
 |
| To start with, this is Merlin. He is my crown-tail male Betta and I
couldn't live without him. He is by far the smallest of my Bettas, and
can never say no to some live daphnia. |
 |
| This is Pi. She is my crown-tail female Betta, and she will jump out of
the water to eat a live daphnia off the tip of my finger. To explain the
cup she is in, I had some issues with the temperature in her previous
tank, so I am temporarily floating her in another Betta tank that is
already at the desired temp. |
 |
| This is Winter, she is my second crown-tail female Betta. She will not
jump for her food like Pi, (yet) but I love her just as much. |
 |
| This is Peach, my male veil-tail Betta. He's spunky, and never misses a chance to show how macho he is. I love this guy. :) |
 |
| This is Tiffy, Jasper and my comet goldfish. She'll eat anything that will fit is her mouth (and some things that won't). |
 |
These are our two new (very small) comet goldfish. We are currently quarantining them for 3 weeks before they go in with Tiffy.
|
 |
This is Kanye, One of Jasper's fish. He is a dwarf gourami. |
These fish all enjoyed their afternoon snack of fresh daphnia and fairy shrimp, and we enjoyed catching it!! Jasper and I cannot wait for the next dry day when we'll go back and catch more ;)
