Can those mudpuppies live in southeast kansas. I'm not seeing a zone chart for them.
"Among the largest of the salamanders, mudpuppies can exceed 16 inches in length, although the average is more like 11 inches. Their range runs from southern central Canada, through the midwestern United States, east to North Carolina and south to Georgia and Mississippi."
Retirement has been keeping me way too busy. Finally got back to the pond yesterday. Mowed for six hours and called it a day. Did that so I could just enjoy this morning. It’s been a good morning. Now I’ve got to go back down with the weed eater.
Stubby!
9 yr old pond, 1 ac, 15' deep. RES, YP, GS, FHM (no longer), HBG (going away), SMB, and HSB (only one seen in 5 yrs) Restocked HSB (2020) Have seen one of these. I think that's about all I should put in my little pond. Otter attack in 2023
SetterGuy, that view is outstanding. Thinking of all you went through to get to this point with your pond development it has to feel great to be this far.
I can't tell for sure but it looks like your water has a little bloom action or at least has a little tea/brown colored stain. That slight reduced visibility should help with keeping algae under control? I don't see much in the way of algae problems or surface weeds so that is a good thing!
I assume the SMB or something else is keeping your bullfrog tadpole population down? I had tons and mine are mostly gone. I have some adult leopard frogs but would love to keep the bullfrogs around if I could
How are your YP?
Any sign of PK shrimp (ghost shrimp)?
Congrats on a beautiful setting and some awesome SMB (even if one got the short end of the stick on the 'length vs width' gene pool.
Very Nice Setter! I know what you mean about getting the mowing done first thing...I tend to mow on Fridays so the rest of my weekend can be spent enjoying the freshness of it all... I hate to waste the fresh look in the middle of the week.
Thx CC and QA. I didn’t fish too long. Brought the weed eater down and got about half the bank cleaned up. Raked a ton of FA from near where the grandkids fish. (Didn’t pull up a single glass shrimp in any of the FA) I did pull out and then return, lots of big bull frog tadpoles. Grandkids coming up next weekend. Want it looking nice. Water level is down about a foot, but we haven’t had much rain recently. About 1/10 of what we’ve been getting in St Louis. Interesting to see the mist coming off the water this morning. I’m sure that, and the fifty or so big trees are a big part of my water level decline.
I didn’t catch a YP today, but I was looking for SMB. That biggest one cleared the water on three jumps. Had me laughing like crazy. Will hopefully catch YP next weekend. I did jump in after a few hours of weed eating. Holy crap, the water had really cooled off. Wasn’t in long!
Last edited by SetterGuy; 09/05/1908:25 PM.
9 yr old pond, 1 ac, 15' deep. RES, YP, GS, FHM (no longer), HBG (going away), SMB, and HSB (only one seen in 5 yrs) Restocked HSB (2020) Have seen one of these. I think that's about all I should put in my little pond. Otter attack in 2023
I see a few questions about Mudpuppies (waterdogs) above.. We have an abundance of these throughout KS and Rstringer, yes, theses are present in SE KS as well. You do NOT want these (the larval stage) in a forage pond mixed community as they will wipe out anything under about 5" in length. They are true hell on FHM. Here's a few Pics of adult Sallys that are as docile as anything gets. Their larval stage is totally different though.
Snipe, I understand that "mudpuppies/waterdogs" can be a common name for the larval state of tiger salamanders, but don't the true mudpuppies (Necturus maculosus) remain under water for their entire lifespan?
Either way, I wonder if they exhibit the same feeding traits as the tiger larva?
I have not lived anyplace that was conducive to salamanders...I wonder if they would prosper in my pond? Tigers would be pretty cool to have around (or would they?).
Snipe I know I prolly shouldn't but if I find a few for sale I'm gunna get some. Maybe only 3 just like the koi I'm hearing I shouldn't have did that either. I'm going to call my pond "On Rebel Pond".
I have those in the pond also along with a couple grass crap. Also let father in law bucket stock some bass. Also have 1 lonely turtle. Which I'm glad theres only 1 so far. I think I'm going to put in some lilly pads also. I want a little bit of everything.
Oh, lovely! Keep an eye on the shortie Where did you get them? Lately I've been thinking about buying some FHM and RES for my property in Hungary but can't find good ones for a reasonable price. My pond there is still a little murky though, maybe I should wait a little more before buying anything.
These I got from my local bait store. He ordered them in for me, regular fish stock I normally get from a fish dealer. These were just convenient to get so I could get things started. Probably only a couple feet of water into the pond so far.
Suddenly it turned muggy and in the high 80s today. Got out of work late so got to hand feed at dusk. Every night just before dusk 4-5 bats come out and swoop around over the pond.
Tonight I happened to be feeding right at dark and the fish were going crazy at the surface snapping up the feed. The bats were unusually low and continued to swoop down into the area of the fish feeding and a few times snapped something off the surface.
Could it be possible they are getting tiny minnows? I can't imagine there were aquatic insects at the surface as the water was quite disturbed and I can't imagine the bats could pick a floating insect off the wavy water.
of course how cool would it be if the bats were snacking on my Optimal Jr. pellets!!
Probably only a high speed camera would really answer the question.
The best guess is that they probably were just getting a drink, yes?
Anthropic - I Couldn't agree more with ya. I'm not interested it trophy's. Mine pond is more for the looks, swimming and fun fishing m feeding. Heck I even let the turtle stick around. Now on to the bats.. I had a couple of mine in our pool before. I was told they drink like that by swooping down on water for a quick drink. Neighbor might have just been BSing me.