Monday, April 6, 2009

Rainbow darter

Traveled down to visit my parents in central Illinois on Saturday. They have two streams running through the back of their property, and I wandered back there to see what fish I could catch with an old butterfly net I found in the garage. The larger of the two streams seems to be doing very well! I caught plenty of minnows, chubs, and dace, as well as a handful of rainbow darters. I really wanted to take them back to Madison to add to the 10 gallon aquarium with the sticklebacks and sculpins, but I didn't think they'd last the trip without an aerator. I'll find a good battery powered one before I go down there next, probably in May.



2 comments:

spotted face said...

I've never seen a rainbow darter up close. They're pretty colorful! Amazing what can be found out there!

Ben said...

Agreed! There's some debate between my friend and I that those darters might have been Iowa darters instead of rainbows. Either way, my photography skills didn't do it justice. The two dorsal fins were what were really colorful, but he has them down in that picture.

Today I bought a batter powered livewell aerator. Next time I visit my parents I'll catch some more and bring them back in a bucket with the aerator hopefully keeping them healthy.