Smiling Sally Slither

Be sure to click on photo to enlarge.
This is Smiling Sally Slither. I see her fairly regularly at the pond swimming from one end to the other or slipping around the edges in the brush, HOWEVER, today is the second day I've come across her down in the nursery right in the middle of the babies. Yesterday I saw Sally put her smiling face under the water and try to catch one but she came up empty handed... uh... mouthed.. She sorta short in the hand department...

Anyway, today she was working in tandem with a bass and she was on one side while a bass was one the other and they had the babies in the middle. They had them hemmed in and were both trying their best to make a grab when I pulled up. Sally doesn't stick around when I get close and today was no different so when she spotted me she ducked for cover under the water and I could see her take off swimming until she was outta sight. One time I saw her carrying a frog in her mouth swimming across the pond.

Smiling Sally is probably about 3-4 or feet long and while she's swimming in the water always has one or two larger bass following her. Of course I don't really know why but while I probably should have been folding clothes and sweeping the kitchen floor yesterday I got to thinking on it and decided that just maybe when Smiling Sally slips up into the grasses along the edges, she may alarm bugs and frogs that might jump alarmed to escape her and just maybe jump into the water right into the waiting jaws of the bass? Could be... you never know... That's my story anyway... I can't think of another reason they might follow her can you? She's much too big for them to eat and I've watched the bass swim with her a lot and they don't look ever look like they intend to take a bite out of her.

You can enlarge this photo by clicking on it and see my fishies.

Today the weather was beautiful, the pond was clear, a lot of fish showed up when I went down around 2 PM. Diamond Jim didn't show today. Meanandlean showed up and worked real hard to catch one of the 200 bluegill that were there but was unsuccessful. What's up with that anyway? Are bass unsuccessful that often? Some of my bass look kinda skinny... There are a jillion bluegill of every shape and size for them to eat. They just don't seem to be all that good at catching them...

Well, I'm off to bed. I've got to think about aeration.