The walkway built out over the new wetland area at Durham Wildlife Trust's Low Barns Reserve at Witton-le-Wear offers excellent opportunities for watching the courtship dances of sticklebacks in spring. A male fish builds a tubular nest in the shallow water from bits of weed, then defends his territory from other males until he's enticed a female to swim through his nest and lay eggs inside. Males guard their nests, fanning water over the eggs, until they hatch. You can watch movies of the whole sequence at
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Brings back memories of those far off carefree days with a net on a piece of stick and a jam jar with a string handle investigating the local streams.
ReplyDeleteYes, those were the days, Midmarsh John....tie a piece of string around the neck of a pop bottle and bait it with bread, sink it to the bottom of the pond, wait for the fish to swim in then.......
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