Stonefly shucks are a very common sight on the freestone streams I fish. But yesterday, they were a very uncommon sight. On the rocks lining a small side channel of the stream, there was a huge collection of recently abandoned golden stone shucks. I say recently because the shucks were on rock surfaces only inches from the stream surface, which means the hatch took place within the past few days.
But the remarkable thing was the split. Right down the middle of the wing case. And so obvious. I’ve never seen that before. Thought you all might enjoy it.
John
P.S. The details of the nymphs were so clear on these shucks and I was so intrigued by the splits that I forgot to turn over a couple to get pix of the underside. Maybe next trip, if I’m so lucky.
I fish this system 3-4 time a week. I check the streamflow daily and personally observe it several times a week. Lately, it has been dropping at least 2-3" per day. If a shuck is on top of a rock surface that is 6" above the current water surface, the insect had to hatch 2-3 days ago, or less. Check out the following pic, taken this morning at the same stretch.
The golden stone shuck to the right is only an inch or two above the water surface. The water has dropped that much since yesterday. The shuck is still soft - hasn’t even had a chance to dry out - and almost as dark as the live nymph - hasn’t even had a chance to bleach out. That golden stone hatched this morning, probably a matter of hours before this pic was taken. As did the other one to the left of the pic.
Oh yeah - the simple take on this is that I fished this same spot two days earlier than the original pix in the openning post and walked right through the same exact area. That huge collection of shucks wasn’t there. I would have noticed them if they had been. That alone tells me they were less than two days old.
John
P.S. Good information on how insects escape their shucks for those who were not aware of that. Thanks for pointing it out.
Near daily observation, and continually dropping water level at a fairly constant rate will do it. Just wanted others to be aware of the fact that they may crawl quite a distance up on a rock, deadfall, etc., before emergence, and that they don’t necessarily emerge right at the waterline soon after getting their body completely out of the water.
Just a word of possible caution. Any of you guys in a state that does not allow individuals to take insects from water containing trout? I don’t know if a DEC guy would necessarily say okay to ‘shucks’, but here in NY I have a few acquaintences who almost got in a lot of trouble because, when they were gathering a few insects for a trout fishing educational program, they forgot the permit they had. Again, from a DEC point of view, I don’t know if a ‘shuck’ would be treated the same as a live insect.
New York State Dept. Envir. Conservation:
“Aquatic Insects No aquatic insect (or any insect that lives in the water during any of its life stages) shall be taken from waters inhabited by trout, or from the banks of those waters at anytime.”
When professionals transplant animals and plants it sometimes ends up badly, when amateurs transplant animals and plants it often ends up badily. When many states are limiting the places you can use felt soles on your shoes why would anyone allow you to intentionally moved organisms from a stream without a permit of some type.
