Thanks for documenting this so clearly and so well! Everytime someone proposes that fish got into a body of water by holding on (with their fins apparently) to raccoon legs or that eggs get stuck on duck feathers.... the 1" long bluegill are feeling very slighted that they do not get the credit they deserve for being incredibly tenacious.

To see these tiny beings saving energy and throwing everything they got into swimming UPHILL in a torrent of water and some of them actually making it.. it speaks to how fish are more likely to transport THEMSELVES to other bodies of water rather than hitching a ride...

I would love to see others especially in southern states set up game cameras by tiny puddles or ponds and see how the fish get into them. I hear that gambusia will show up 'by themselves' in almost any body of water. It seems if you took a backhoe and dug a little depression and set up a game camera, and if fish did show up in there that it should be pretty easy to catch the GBH or raccoon or duck that landed there. And if they don't drop in from the sky or are carried in by another creature, then that puddle of water should stay void of fish, right?

Great things we learn on this forum!