Blue-winged Olives
Baetis
Tiny Baetis mayflies are perhaps the most commonly encountered and imitated by anglers on all American trout streams due to their great abundance, widespread distribution, and trout-friendly emergence habits.
Mayfly Species Anthopotamus distinctus (Golden Drakes)
Where & when
Though present in the Midwest, this species is most important in the East, where it constitutes the Golden Drake hatch on the freestone streams of the Catskills and the mountain ranges of Pennsylvania.It typically peaks in Pennsylvania in late June and early July, and in the Catskills a couple weeks later. There dates for this hatch can be unusually variable.
In 8 records from GBIF, adults of this species have been collected during July (50%), June (38%), and May (13%).
Species Range
Physical description
Most physical descriptions on Troutnut are direct or slightly edited quotes from the original scientific sources describing or updating the species, although there may be errors in copying them to this website. Such descriptions aren't always definitive, because species often turn out to be more variable than the original describers observed. In some cases, only a single specimen was described! However, they are useful starting points.
Male Spinner
Wing length: 11 mm
Eyes of male moderately large; cross veins of both wings black; vertex, middle of pronotum, fore femur and tibia reddish; a continuous wide lateral purplish red abdominal stripe.
Vertex of head red, except a narrow yellow strip next to eye; bases of antennae reddish, filament pale. Ocelli pale greyish flushed with pink; dark-ringed at base. Eyes black, moderately large, separated by a space slightly greater than one diameter of eye. Pronotum yellowish, with wide red median dorsal stripe. Mesonotum yellowish red, scutellum paler. Pleura and sternum yellowish, somewhat flushed with pink. Metanotum yellowish white. Fore femur quite deep red, extreme base yellowish; tibia reddish, deeper in basal half, tinged with yellow apically, purplish black at tip; short basal tarsal joint purplish black, other joints yellow faintly tinged with reddish, claws and joinings blackish brown. Middle and hind legs yellow, claws tinged with fuscous. Wings hyaline; main longitudinal veins of costal margin yellow, other longitudinals pale yellowish white. Cross veins of both wings, except outer margin of hind wing and anal region of both wings, black.
Abdomen pale yellowish. A wide continuous purplish red stripe occupies lateral areas of abdominal tergites; posterior margins narrowly darker, within this stripe. Sternites unmarked. Genitalia yellowish. Tails yellowish, joinings distinctly reddish brown.
Female Spinner
Wing length: 11 mm
Female very similar to male. Wings faintly amber-tinged; cross veins black, in both wings. All markings as in male.
Start a Discussion of Anthopotamus distinctus
References
- Arbona, Fred Jr. 1989. Mayflies, the Angler, and the Trout. Nick Lyons Books.
- Caucci, Al and Nastasi, Bob. 2004. Hatches II. The Lyons Press.
- Fauceglia, Ted. 2005. Mayflies . Stackpole Books.
- Knopp, Malcolm and Robert Cormier. 1997. Mayflies: An Angler's Study of Trout Water Ephemeroptera . The Lyons Press.
- Needham, James G., Jay R. Traver, and Yin-Chi Hsu. 1935. The Biology of Mayflies. Comstock Publishing Company, Inc.
- Schwiebert, Ernest G. 1955. Matching the Hatch. MacMillan Publishing Company.
Mayfly Species Anthopotamus distinctus (Golden Drakes)
Species Range
Common Names
Resources
- NatureServe
- Integrated Taxonomic Information System
- Global Biodiversity Information Facility
- Described by Traver (1935)