How fish get into an unstocked pond

[drssg]

I've seen it mentioned here and other places that waterfowl carry fish eggs in from other bodies of water, but I have not read about specifically *how* that happens.

I pictured eggs somehow getting stuck to a duck's foot or something, and then rinsing off in another location. While that seemed possible, it also seemed like a rare event. My pond was teaming with minnows less than a year after it was dug.

It turns out that ducks can eat fish eggs, poop them out somewhere else, and they can still hatch. This seems like a much more likely event, since ducks basically eat and poop all the time.

Fish eggs can hatch after being eaten and pooped out by ducks | Science News

 

[jaydee325]

I've seen it mentioned here and other places that waterfowl carry fish eggs in from other bodies of water, but I have not read about specifically *how* that happens.

I pictured eggs somehow getting stuck to a duck's foot or something, and then rinsing off in another location. While that seemed possible, it also seemed like a rare event. My pond was teaming with minnows less than a year after it was dug.

It turns out that ducks can eat fish eggs, poop them out somewhere else, and they can still hatch. This seems like a much more likely event, since ducks basically eat and poop all the time.

Fish eggs can hatch after being eaten and pooped out by ducks | Science News

Mother Nature is very tenacious!!!

 

[homesteader13]

Very interesting, thank you for sharing!
We have a pond up in the Rockies and it has goldfish in it, don't know if it has anything else, we haven't had that property for very long. I guess we will find out next year when we drain it to do some work on it.

 

[jmc]

Turtles and frogs migrate (back when there were more of them), but I've never seen them get any scientific credit for propagating fish eggs.

 

[Fuddy1952]

Many years ago I worked for a company that hired this lady very "uppity". In the lunchroom one day she said "last night I dined on champagne and caviar!".
An older fellow said "I didn't know you liked fish eggs". She didn't know that's what it was. They should have Duck Poop Caviar.

 

[ruffdog]

"Life finds a way!

 

[Wagtail]

We've got many species of "Yabby", a freshwater crayfish, that inhabit streams and dams. They're good eating!

According to Google research, they migrate overland to populate an isolated dam. If the dam dries up, they'll bury themselves deep into the mud and hibernate until the rains come and re-fill the dam.

 

[drssg]

We've got many species of "Yabby", a freshwater crayfish, that inhabit streams and dams. They're good eating!

According to Google research, they migrate overland to populate an isolated dam. If the dam dries up, they'll bury themselves deep into the mud and hibernate until the rains come and re-fill the dam.

We have crayfish that regularly live in the ground. They dig holes that can go fairly deep to find water, and they leave mounds of dirt around the entrance to their hole. When I'm mowing, I try to run over the dirt pile with a wheel, so I don't dull the mower blades on the dirt.

Their breeding season seems to be in the early spring. At the first sign of warm weather, they are all over the place, and I can have several of them walking down my barn isle. The females all have a cluster of eggs under their tale, but the males and females all seem to wander around completely aimlessly. Based on their numbers, they are obviously reproducing successfully, but I don't know how.

 

[Diggin It]

My pond was teaming with minnows less than a year after it was dug.

It turns out that ducks can eat fish eggs, poop them out somewhere else, and they can still hatch. This seems like a much more likely event, since ducks basically eat and poop all the time.

Your minnows are crappies?

 

[oosik]

Eight years ago a neighbor and I went to a local lake and caught a bucket full of young bass. Now my lake has a good stock of large & small mouth bass. I don't think I could live long enough to have my lake repopulated by fish eggs in duck crap.