Justin from MA and Josh from NH joined me for some native collecting in Eastern NY today. We all had a great time and added to Justins species total from last Saturday. We had our own fishy version of Henny Youngman as Josh kept the fishy one liners coming on the drives between sites. I don't want to share any now as I'm hoping he'll have a stand up routine on Youtube soon. We made a return to our Schoharie creek site and went up a small trib to get a male fantail darter which we could not find last week and this week only found one and about 30 females each fat with eggs. I can't remember ever having this much trouble finding male fantails but with all the fat females the males must be due soon. We tried some slack water areas not sampled last week and found hundreds of rosyface shiners, bluntnose minnows, young central stonerollers and a few spotfin shiners as well as small pumpkinseed sunnies. A few riffle samples confirmed the same riffle species found last week. We then headed to a return to Fox creek to further investigate the Rainbow darter situation and quickly found 15 more rainbow darters; male, female and a couple small juveniles over a few sets of riffles. We also found some nice central stonerollers and a few Banded killies. The biggest male had a beautfull blue sheen over dark bars, actually the little 1 inch male had the same. In another small backwater we trapped some 3-4 inch minnows which we could not identify, looked like brassy minnows but I don't think they are located here. We then headed to East Berne for lunch and ice cream. Then to the stream to show Josh some redside dace. we also added some species to Justin's list here as we found some Northern Hog suckers, Some giant Brook Sticklebacks, more Pumpkinseeds. Also found some beautiful creek chubs fully colored up as well as everything found last week.

Also just for fun the first person that can correctly guess from the following description one of the new species we seined up this trip will get four redside dace for the cost of shipping.

Here's the clues simply reply with your answer:

1. oval body shape
2. solid dark almost black/brown color
3. use sticks to make "nest"
4. prefers slower silty pools
5. round tail also dark color
6. has some serious looking teeth
7. size roughly three
8. sometimes uses tail slapping at surface similar to southern killiefish as a warning
9. actually has scales on their tail

Edited by keepnatives, 17 May 2009 - 12:05 AM.

There is at least one fellow on this list who would like some of those in preference to the dace.

haahh that fish was crazy...ill be posting the pics in a few minutes from this trip.

You seined a beaver?! I've shocked one out of a den before and that was borderline terrifying.

You seined a beaver?! I've shocked one out of a den before and that was borderline terrifying.

Hahah looks like you earned some some redsided dace lol

You seined a beaver?! I've shocked one out of a den before and that was borderline terrifying.

Yes we did and man they look big in a seine up close! Josh and I were seining a small hole and i directed him to use his brail to block off escape by the branch protruding into the creek while I poked my brail under the bank from the other side to see what might be hiding there. Suddenly this 3 foot black furball rockets into the eight foot seine. "Beaver" I scream in warning as I back pedal trying to manipulate the seine to keep it from advancing on Josh who had backed away into a jumble of sticks and frozen thinking the rest of the beaver clan had surrounded him. To his credit he never let go of the seine but alas the weight of the beaver kept part of the seine in the creek so we did lose all the fish from that sampling attempt. (How many times must you tell a novice to keep the net up) Meanwhile Justin showing his concern for our safety, delayed pulling out his camra as he dove over the large tree fallen across the creek, and missed recording the most exciting catch of the day. None of us had a tank of adequate size so we let him go before realizing Justin had not gotten the photo. And Justin showed his colors when he announced that we should do it again now that he had his camra ready....Josh and I passed. Well, I think this one trip we will remember.

Pm me with your address to claim your prize.

Edited by keepnatives, 17 May 2009 - 09:04 AM.

pics

Edited by bumpylemon, 17 May 2009 - 12:55 PM.

Looks like a fun time, those redsides are beautiful. Cannot imagine pulling up a beaver (great story BTW), though I have had encounters with muskrats.

Edited by sandtiger, 17 May 2009 - 01:15 PM.

Man, Mike, you've one upped it. I thought the seineful of cottonmouth at the MO convention was impressive. But a beaver? Now that's a dangerous pissed off animal, mainly because you have no way to control it! lol!

Great story guys!

Todd

Yeah, I never considered netting a beaver; the worst to date is a large snapping turtle. But also, thanks to Mike for being in a NANFA t-shirt and contributing to that thread in another thread...

That's gotta be hard on your seine, as well as your nerves.

Yeah, I never considered netting a beaver; the worst to date is a large snapping turtle. But also, thanks to Mike for being in a NANFA t-shirt and contributing to that thread in another thread...

I've also shocked a beaver that rammed into me before. It was confusing to say the least. My most interesting seine haul, though, was several caiman when seining across a deep ditch while in Costa Rica(while wearing shorts and tennis shoes, no less).

That's gotta be hard on your seine, as well as your nerves.

Yeah that was the first thing I thought once the beaver got loose. Unbelievably I didn't see any rips or holes that weren't aleady there. Considering how heavy he was I feel very lucky.

Yeah that was the first thing I thought once the beaver got loose. Unbelievably I didn't see any rips or holes that weren't aleady there. Considering how heavy he was I feel very lucky.

Yes, catching the beaver was exciting and unnerving, i dropped the net and bolted backed up to shore in a panic and ended up trapped between two logs (I thought three due to a branch behind me, i thought i was cornered). Thankfully it didn't persue me.

Also at our last stop we got creek chubs, tesselated darter, and white sucker.

It looks like we should have waited till Sunday for our trip. Our beaver site was within a few miles of a small 3.0 earthquake. Turns out there's been about 15 in the area since February. Hey, maybe I'm not stumbling more because of my age after all!

It looks like we should have waited till Sunday for our trip. Our beaver site was within a few miles of a small 3.0 earthquake. Turns out there's been about 15 in the area since February. Hey, maybe I'm not stumbling more because of my age after all!

hahah soo thats why i kept tripping lol