Artistic view of a Male Pteronarcys californica (Pteronarcyidae) (Giant Salmonfly) Stonefly Adult from the Gallatin River in Montana

Salmonflies
Pteronarcys californica

The giant Salmonflies of the Western mountains are legendary for their proclivity to elicit consistent dry-fly action and ferocious strikes.

This is one of the many shallow, unnamed lakes in the Arctic coastal plain near the Dalton Highway.

From Dalton Highway in Alaska

Stream photos

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Epeorus albertae (Pink Lady) Mayfly Nymph Epeorus albertae (Pink Lady) Mayfly Nymph

Dorsal view of a Epeorus albertae (Heptageniidae) (Pink Lady) Mayfly Nymph from the East Fork Issaquah Creek in Washington

This specimen keys to the Epeorus albertae group of species. Of the five species in that group, the two known in Washington state are Epeorus albertae and Epeorus dulciana. Of the two, albertae has been collected in vastly more locations in Washington than dulciana, suggesting it is far more common. On that basis alone I'm tentatively putting this nymph in albertae, with the large caveat that there's no real information to rule out dulciana.

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27" brown trout, my largest ever. It was the sub-dominant fish in its pool. After this, I hooked the bigger one, but I couldn't land it.

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Male Malenka tina (Tiny Winter Black) Stonefly Adult Pictures

This is the smallest stonefly I've ever collected, with a body only 5.5 mm long.

Although not in-focus in my pictures, its first tarsal segment is similar in length to the third, while the second is much shorter. This helps with family-level identification.

Examining this specimen under a microscope shows a membranous lobe on the dorsal base of the cerci, which is the key characteristic in Merritt & Cummins (4th ed.) to place the genus definitively as Malenka.

Following the species key in Jewett Jr's Stoneflies of the Pacific Northwest, the species appears to be Malenka tina. My dissecting microscope seems to show sternite 9 ending in a rounded knob, which distinguishes it from Malenka bifurcata, but the detail is hard to work out.

Also worth noting is that Montana appears to have this species, whereas birfucata is not know there: http://fieldguide.mt.gov/displaySpecies.aspx?family=Nemouridae