A Crawdad Out for a Stroll in the Sun

With birds having taken the spotlight the last three Tuesday / Thursday posts, I figured it was time for a bit of a change this evening. And this is definitely a change from recent posts. This series of photos was taken on my walk along the South Salado Creek Greenway Friday, September 9.

As I had mentioned in the post for that walk, the springs were still flowing in spite of the ongoing drought. Crawdads, as I grew up calling them, thrive in South Texas in outflow streams from springs. While I was admiring the outflow from one of the springs, this crawdad emerged from the mud and made its way into the water of the stream.

The crawdad is a freshwater cousin of the lobster. It goes by many other names: crayfish, crawfish, mudbug, freshwater lobster and probably more. It may not be the most attractive creature I have featured on this blog, but it is definitely a common and important member of the South Texas bio-community.