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Re: NFC: Collecting after the Rain

" A bad day collecting is still better then  other
days doing other things".

You had a Good day! I am looking forward to getting
out here in icy NYS.
jake
--- Al G Eaton <sege7_2000 at yahoo_com> wrote:
> I had had just about enough of this cold winter, so
> I
> decided to tromp around in one of my favorite areas
> over the weekend.  Tennessee and Kentucky had a
> torrential rainstorm on Thursday/Friday, but I
> thought
> I would see what I could find in the smaller streams
> anyway.  It was in the low 20s when I went out 
> Saturday morning and drove from Nashville to
> Trammel's
> Fork to find the stream well out of its banks
> covering
> my favorite riffles and springs.  I saw two small
> streams that flow into Trammel's Fork of the Barren
> River with water gushing through them that had been
> dry when I had been there last summer.  I found fish
> in the rivulets.  I caught baskets full of blacknose
> dace which I promptly threw back as well as
> bluntnose
> shiners and fathead minnows.  I worked downstream
> and
> came to a section that had watercress growing along
> the margins and a scooped out area beneath a beech
> tree.  I caught the delightful Barrens River form of
> Southern Red Belly Dace, a pair of Orangethroat
> Darters, Northern Studfish, Splendid Darters
> (Etheostoma barrenense, Tennessee Shiners, Creek
> Chubs, and a few other shiners and minnows I didn't
> try to ID.  
> 
> Since I only had one splendid darters and I wanted a
> few more I decided to try a wide spot in Trammel's
> Fork where the water was 2 ft or less deep.  I
> worked
> along the margins of the stream in the grass where
> there was minimal current and I collected two more
> splendid shiners, a few sculpins and what looks like
> a
> brindled madtom though it could be another species,
> the madtom was only 3/4 of an inch.
> 
> As I got out I was greeted by the farmer and his
> dog. 
> He was out walking his property to see if any fences
> had washed away.  He indicated the stream had been
> four feet higher only the day before.  I showed him
> the fish I had caught and he was astounded by the
> colors of the darters. 
> 
> I drove down the road and stopped at a church to get
> some more water.  I took my dipnet with me and I am
> glad I did as I caught more orangethroat darters and
> about a dozen Barrens River form of SRBD.  I wanted
> to
> take a picture of the watercress growing in the
> bottom
> of the stream... as I crouched over to get closer I
> kept thinking I had a little more room to crouch
> when
> I dunked my butt in the cold water (I had thigh high
> waders on.  I made the drive back to Nashville with
> wet trousers and quite a few representatives of the
> fish in Trammmel's Fork.  The one I didn't find and
> I
> wanted was the Orangefin Darter, I will have another
> shot later this spring.
> 
> Sunday, I drove to the Red River(west cumberland
> drainage) and found the stream wadeable in the head
> water region in Northern Tennessee.  I climbed down
> the bank and worked a swollen riffle with a stiff
> current and caught some redline darters (Etheostoma
> rufiliniatum).  I also caught some rainbow darters
> that reminded me of the type I caught in the Ozarks
> last summer, and I caught Etheostoma atripinne in
> the
> brush along the banks and Etheostoma squamiceps.
> Along
> the banks I caught more Northern Studfish.  In the
> swiftest part of the stream I found sculpins.  
> 
> I took some photographs and went to put the fish
> away.
>  As I pulled back the seat to put the bucket in the
> cab I saw that one of my buckets from saturday had
> fallen over.  I quickly took off the top and I saw
> it
> was empty of water, but the fish were still inside. 
> I
> took the lid off the other bucket and I emptied the 
> fish into the other container to find that all of
> them
> were still alive and eventually all of them swam
> happily in the bucket. 
> 
> I made the five hour drive home and put the fish up
> taking care to acclimate them properly over night . 
> I
> had zero losses even with the empty bucket incident.
> 
> Klaus
>   
> 
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