Well it looks as though another beautiful spring weekend has passed as we saunter into a new week of Wild Facts.  I hope the weather was nice for all of you – it was beautiful in the Yukon.  Over the weekend, I had a chance to check out the Environment Fair and one of the best booths by far was the Fisheries and Oceans Canada booth.  I would like to take this opportunity to thank the lovely ladies in charge of the booth for inspiring today’s Wild Fact!  How did they inspire today’s fact you ask?  Well, besides having a dissected salmon they also had a pretty sweet insect display.   It just so happens that among the aquatic insects on display were the ever important Stoneflies.  Why are they so important?  Actually there are a couple of reasons.  You see, they provide food to the wonderful fish, and they can also be used as an indicator species for watershed health.  So let’s take a minute to explore the life of this indicator insect, shall we?

If you want to observe Stoneflies in their natural habitat (and not in tray at the Environment Fair) then you will need to get your feet wet. As well, I want you to be very careful since these aquatic insects require well oxygenated water, which means they are usually found in rivers or streams.  Although, there are a few that hang out along rocky shoals of cold water lakes.  Either way, you will find them hiding under branches and of course stones (this is probably how they got their common name).

So far, I have only been talking about the nymph stage of the Stonefly since they spend about 1 to 4 years in this stage.  When they are ready and during specific times of the year, Stoneflies will emerge as an adult and live for a few weeks.  Some species of  adult Stoneflies do not have mouth parts and as such won’t feed.  The lucky ones with mouth parts simply feed on plants.  Their food preference is fairly diverse while they are living in the water.  Many species will simply feed on aquatic vegetation and the extremely tasty benthic algae. But there are a few species that will hunt down aquatic arthopods so if you are an aquatic bug – you better be able to tell the different species apart!

Stoneflies Fast Fact – Remember how I said that Stoneflies are an important indicator of aquatic health?  Of course you do.  It turns out that these insects represent healthy watersheds since they simply cannot survive in areas with high water pollution.  So if you see Stoneflies in the creek then you can probably assume that the water quality is decent.

That just about does it for the first fact of the week.  I hope you enjoyed it and I will see you back here tomorrow.