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3. Little J caddis?

herewith my first attempt to photograph and share a bug.

Best Fishing Buddy welcomed the little guy and asked me if is a caddis. told him i had no idea. maybe it's time for one of those books about bugs on the stream; up to now we've just gone by what the local fly shops tell us to use, so we know the fishing flies better than the real bugs. the pictures on this site under caddis are sort of the same shape.

handheld digital camera with the SAP on--more practice needed, that's for sure! bug hung around quite patiently for a minute and then took off.

Cool bug! That's an alderfly, not a caddisfly. It's a relative of the hellgrammites/dobsonflies/fishflies. It isn't a bug that trout anglers talk about very often. I've got some pictures of the larvae on this site but none of the adults.

Thanks for the ID, Jason. I believe I saw some of these on the J. How does one distinguish them from Caddis?

Hope the fishing is going well, I'll be looking for a Pocono report soon.

Louis,
Alderflies have 4 large wings............
Wings are dark brown or gray and heavily veined!

Louis-

Antennae of the alderfly adults are only ½ the body length, as opposed to the caddisfly adults, whose antennae are as long as (or longer than) the body length.

Look at how the alderfly has a big, wide, flat head and thorax that kind of fit together. Then look at pictures of some caddisflies and you'll see they've all got relatively tiny heads very distinct from the thorax. That seems to be the most obvious difference at a glance, to me.

Also, look on the side view -- you can see all those appendages that run down the side of the larvae. They're still present in the adults.

Not sure how I arrived at this site as I was looking for a book by Glenn Wiggins. But very interesting. The easiest way to separate adults of caddis from megalops is the hairy (tricho) wings of the caddis and the hairless, shiny (glabrous) wings of the megalops. Great photos so I look forward to spending the rest of the night wandering through them.

Welcome, Creno. I don't know a lot about bugs, but you use enough big words to impress me. Even though you haven't been lurking, you may want to introduce yourself in the "Longtime reader, never-time poster" thread so we can learn a little bit about you.

-Shawn

Shawn - I don't see the forum you suggest so I will reply here. You will see I have spent the afternoon wandering through the rest of the caddis on the site. Amazing stuff! And not just the photos that Troutnut and others put up, but the easy access to all this great information and communication. You folks need to be proud of what you have compiled. Sorry for the big words - I will try to do better.

I used to fish alot (250+ days one year) and now I look at caddis alot (250+ days every year). The majority of my experience has been in the western US but I look at enough eastern material to understand I don't understand it. So I keep plugging away. The photos are really great as most of us bug pickers don't look at any, let alone enough, live material.

If folks looking at this site would like caddis species level determinations for their adult material I would be glad to look at small quantities that are well preserved/documented and do my best. All I ask is that I may keep representative material that I may not have in my collection. In general larval material (and unfortunately too may females) cannot yet be reliably resolved to the species level. It will take the work of both the angling and scientific communities many years yet to work this out.

With best wishes to all for the holidays!

dave - druiter@msn.com

And best to you Dave.