re: What is this creature ?

Your parents grass is in great shape. Tell them congrats!

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Thats a lamprey, lampede, lampreder, lampeder.

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First, maybe in your neck of the woods they colloquially are called a lamprey. There are a lot of animals that share common names with a very different type of organism because they roughly resemble something else morphologically. An example is the speckled trout, as it is actually in the same family as marine drum species like redfish and not related to river trout such as the rainbow trout.

Second, a lamprey is not a type of eel. The fact that you are trying to say that it is a lamprey AND an eel leads me to believe that you have no clue what the correct name for the animal is.

I am not denying that an amphiuma may be called a lamprey or eel in some places. However, I am saying that taxonomically it is neither, and has a more correct common name.

Now that you pointed it out that is a good looking yard!

Caught an amphiuma last fall at my dad's I conclude after an epic rain displaced him from the ditch he would normally inhabitate. Freaky looking sum bitch. Especially back then when nether one of us knew wtf it was. I emailed a scientist and asked about it. He sent me a shite ton of info on them. Check it out...

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On Oct 26, 2015, at 7:36 PM, "Glorioso, Brad" gloriousob@usgs.gov wrote:

That is an amphiuma, an aquatic salamander. Some people confuse these guys as eels, which is a fish. This is an amphibian. They do move overland in heavy rains, but typically reside in slow-moving or still water bodies. They are common inhabitant of ditches, ponds, and swamps. They actually have pretty respectable teeth and you do not want to be on the end of this amphibian's bite. Plus, if they do bite you, they twirl around like a croc does until they rip some flesh off. Luckily they are not very aggressive but will sometimes flail around when handled with their mouth open. I have been sliced open in the past. I actually published a study on these guys from my days in Tennessee. In Baton Rouge, you have the three-toed amphiuma and possibly the two-toed amphiuma. If you look closely at its four tiny limbs and count the toes it may be enough tot ell which species you have. Sometimes this does not work however, and you have to go by a few other characters concerning coloration. You need to get this guy into water or he could potentially desiccate. In the wild if their water body is drying up they burrow deep into the mud and wrap themselves in a slimy cocoon where they wait it out until the rains come to fill up their water body. They eat pretty much anything they can find, but they particularly like siren, another type of aquatic salamander.

-Bones _________________________________________

Brad 'Bones' Glorioso Ecologist U.S. Geological Survey, National Wetlands Research Center 700 Cajundome Blvd., Lafayette, LA 70506

337-266-8836 (office)
504-250-4760 (cell) gloriosob@usgs.gov https://profile.usgs.gov/gloriosob

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https://amphibiaweb.org/species/3855 https://www.stlzoo.org/animals/abouttheanimals/amphibians/salamandersandnewts/threetoedamphiuma/

https://nationalzoo.si.edu/animals/reptilesamphibians/facts/factsheets/threetoedamphiuma.cfm

If you wanted to keep it, though I would not recommend it, there is some good information here.

https://www.caudata.org/cc/species/Amphiuma/Amphiuma.shtml

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River / mud eel

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bait

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Damn I'd hate to see wtf you fishing for if that's the bait?!?!

bad rain those frickers would come out in Saint Gabriel at my old house as well

Has it asked you for tree fiddy?

amphiuma