bizarre pond creature

[mimififi]

Hi there,

some of you may remember that I built a nature pond in my garden last year. It is doing swimmingly and I'm so pleased with it, many resident animals plus birds and hedgehogs visit my pond, making me feel very smug amoung my fellow organic alotmenteers!

anyways, I go out to pond this morning, reading for some low key maintenance like removing the plastic bag which had blown in and I saw the most bizarre looking creature swimming along and was so shocked by it's appearance have wasted valuable cleaning time trying to id it by trawling the net and various 'identify your pond life' books.

this is what it looked like:

about and inch to an inch and quarter long
looked like it was in a hard case of somekind, or it could just have been a tough exoskeleton of some kind.
didn't have that many legs that I could see and wasn't really fast swimming.

apart from that, it just looked really bizarre. I don't think it is a cadisfly nymph, but I don't know what else it could be.

does anyone know what this could be or know of some good id sites to look on. It was an hour ago now that I saw it and i'm forgetting ab it exactly what it was like so couldn't do an identikit photo or anything.....but am intrigued immensely.

anyways, thanks in advance, and happy weekends to you all..
love
mimififi
XXXXXXXXXX

[Cetti]

This is the first exhibit for you, mimififi - a dragonfly larva.

A fearsome looking beast that is as nasty as it appears. Hard to imagine it will eventually turn into such a beautiful creature.

http://www.habitas.org.uk/dragonflyireland/ana tomy_2.htm

[Cetti]

Exhibit no:2

Some more pond 'nasties' for you to look at.

You might want to have a rethink about your bug not being a Caddisfly, as it does fit your description and according to this link there are over 200 different species - and I thought there was just the one!

http://www.wwtlearn.org.uk/index0.html?factfil e/pond-safari.htm&2

[allotment10]

http://atschool.eduweb.co.uk/abbotbeyne/roslis ton/Pond%20Creatures/creatures.html

http://www.microscopy-uk.org.uk/index.html?htt p://www.microscopy-uk.org.uk/pond/insects.html

http://www.penobscotswcd.org/publications/inse cts.pdf

hi mimi, i have a wildlife pond on my allotment and see some really wierd creatures in and on the pond! it's really hard to identify some of them
even tho i've scrolled thro many a site, (perhaps they are aliens :-D
anyway hope the above sites can help you .

[mimififi]

well, I am pleased to report back after looking at the excellent sites all you found on my behalf, I thnk it is a dragonfly nymph as cetti said. Two of the sites had pictures which really jogged my memory, esp the part about the extendable jaws.

I am so thrilled as dragon flies as so beautiful, I can't wait to see one in the garden......

thanks guys, I owe you all pints!

[Cetti]

Mine's a Dubonnet & lemonade, mimi - I couldn't even handle half a pint :-)

[allotment10]

my weakness is a large gin & tonic, loads of lemon! cheers :-)
my old man (mr allotment) would soon nick it off me if you got me a pint!
ps: we have loads of dragonflies come to the pond, aren't they fantastic, i especially love the spiders that seem to walk on the water, and just love it when the tadpoles become baby frogs,
hope you have many more happy days chilling out with the wonderful world of nature :-)