CRAZY CRITTERS IN OR NEAR THE CREEK
So, I was sliding into one of those wooden red “Adirondack” (look it up) chairs, overlooking Abbott Lake at Peaks of Otter (VA). When suddenly, a big buzz and vibration occurred on the side of my leg. I got up and what did I see?
Cicada sex!
You know, those big, blackish bugs with the mostly transparent wings and the “whirr, whirr, whine” sound up in the trees, the males trying to scout out a girlfriend with that annoying song, I found below me in the grass two mating cicadas (pushed end to end), and I think both had one broken wing, which was unfortunate, so there was only a little more whining. I don’t know if the female later crawled to a tree and deposited her eggs in a crack in that tree to help her young along.
So also crazy are the tiny, tiny macroinvertebrates (bugs without a backbone) you find in mostly healthy (read: clean) streams and creeks, like mayflies, stoneflies, hellgrammites and the like. Yes, these insects are usually a quarter inch to 2 and a half inches long (the crane fly larva looks like a grayish caterpillar in the water). Yes, a magnifying glass would certainly help! And with S. O. S. there are supposed to be 150 found at one sitting.
Salmon are very strong swimmers, yet it’s surprising that they can actually get out of the grip of a grizzly in Alaska with its big, lumbering claws. Imagine if “you” had to return to the town where you were born in order to have a child of your own. A bit crazy? Well, not for people from small towns with a lot of family nearby. Or salmon fish.
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