Help Beefy Identify the Mystery Organism

[beefy]

 

[rufus]

It looks like kelp. If it isn't kelp, but some animal organism, it looks like trouble.

Rufus

 

[pdsavage]

where did you find it at,was it alive when you found it,can you put like a dime or other change next to it so we can judge size.

 

[Farmer Kitty]

I'm assuming you mean that brown thing that is bigger on one end then gets skinny. Was/is it alive? If so, did it creep like an inch worm? It looks to me like what we call a "mouse". It's a developmental stage of flies. That will crawl off into a place it deams as good and then it will get a dry crusty outside and then hatch into a fly.

 

[patandchickens]

I answered Beefy over on the garden forum where this was also posted, but for anyone who's curious, it's a "rat-tailed maggot". Seriously. The aquatic larva of a syrphid hoverfly. Basically harmless, allegedly good fishbait, all-around cool gross pond critter

(e.t.a - as Miss Kitty says, they are also sometimes called 'mouses'. They pupate terrestrially, so you can indeed sometimes see them roaming near the edges of skanky stagnant muddy organicky ponds/ditches/puddles etc)

Pat

 

[Katy]

That is just disgusting.

 

[BearSwampChick]

Nas-ty!

 

[chickiebaby]

ah, the line between disgusting and beautiful is a thin one indeed . . .

 

[beefy]

it was in a pot that has a palmetto palm in it with a bunch of bark in for mulch to keep the chickens from digging in it and it collects rain water b/c it doesnt have drainage so when i went i went to dump the water (again) i found those. there were five and i gave them to the chickens. i'm sure there are others in the pot, i'll just leave them be.

http://bugguide.net/node/view/7183


at least its not a bee or i would feel really bad...

 

[Zookeeper9000]

Well when I first read the title I sure didn't think he was asking us to idenify that LOL. Good thing I read it twice before I clicked and posted hey LOL