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**Mayfly Species Ephemerella subvaria (Hendrickson)**

Mayflies

Caddisflies

Stoneflies

Taxonomic Navigation -?-

Kingdom Animalia (Animals)

» Phylum Arthropoda (Arthropods)

» Class Insecta (Insects)

» Order Ephemeroptera (Mayflies)

» Family Ephemerellidae (Hendricksons, Sulphurs, PMDs, BWOs)

» Genus Ephemerella (Hendricksons, Sulphurs, PMDs)

» Species subvaria (Hendrickson)

Common Names

Match	Common Name
	Hendrickson
	Dark Hendrickson
	Red Quill Spinner
	Red Quill
	Lady Beaverkill
	Whirling Dun
	Borcher Drake
	Beaverkill

Pictures Below ↓

This is page 4 of specimens of Ephemerella subvaria. Visit the main Ephemerella subvaria page for:

The behavior and habitat of Ephemerella subvaria.
24 underwater pictures of Ephemerella subvaria.

Pictures of 34 Mayfly Specimens in the Species Ephemerella subvaria:

Specimen Page:1 2 345

Female Ephemerella subvaria (Hendrickson) Mayfly Dun

View 3 Pictures

Collected May 1, 2004 from the Namekagon River in Wisconsin
Added to Troutnut.com by Troutnut on January 25, 2006

Ephemerella subvaria (Hendrickson) Mayfly Nymph

View 3 Pictures

Collected January 12, 2004 from unknown in Wisconsin
Added to Troutnut.com by Troutnut on January 25, 2006

Female Ephemerella subvaria (Hendrickson) Mayfly Spinner

View 3 PicturesThis one's a bit bedraggled because it was rainy and I had a hard time keeping anything dry, including the container I was putting mayflies in. I was practically juggling up there balanced on a rock trying to catch mayflies and trout at the same time.

Collected May 19, 2004 from the Bois Brule River in Wisconsin
Added to Troutnut.com by Troutnut on January 25, 2006

Female Ephemerella subvaria (Hendrickson) Mayfly Spinner

View 3 Pictures

Collected May 19, 2004 from unknown in Wisconsin
Added to Troutnut.com by Troutnut on January 25, 2006

Ephemerella subvaria (Hendrickson) Mayfly Nymph

View 3 PicturesThis is one of the nymphs I collected doing something very, very strange on March 17th 2004. In the middle of the day, around 2 pm, in the water right around my feet I watched lots of Ephemerella nymphs clumsily swimming up all the way to the surface and then just kind of drifting and wiggling around in the water column. None hatched. They seemed to do it more intensely when the sun was out. It wasn't the time of day for the normal invertebrate drift phenomenon, and as far as I know invertebrate drift doesn't involve this kind of clear effort to swim all the way to the surface. I didn't need a net to catch them, I just reached down into the water and grabbed them with my fingers just below the surface.

The prominent abdominal tubercles (

A few (not all) of the abdominal tubercles on this Ephemerella needhami nymph are circled. They are especially large in this species.

Tubercle: Various peculiar little bumps or projections on an insect. Their character is important for the identification of many kinds of insects, such as the nymphs of Ephemerellidae mayflies.) aren't quite black, though, and the general color is a dark brown, though I saw nymphs with all Hendrickson color stages behaving strangely.

Collected March 17, 2004 from the Namekagon River in Wisconsin
Added to Troutnut.com by Troutnut on January 25, 2006

Ephemerella subvaria (Hendrickson) Mayfly Nymph

View 2 PicturesHere's another of the nymphs I collected behaving strangely, as described for this specimen.

Collected March 17, 2004 from unknown in Wisconsin
Added to Troutnut.com by Troutnut on January 25, 2006

Ephemerella subvaria (Hendrickson) Mayfly Nymph

View 2 PicturesI've never seen this strange coloration on any Ephemerella subvaria nymph in a book before, but it's similar to several other specimens I collected on the same outing, including a larger one that I photographed. They were outnumbered by the "normal" Ephemerella subvaria nymphs in the sample.

Collected March 29, 2005 from Salmon Creek in New York
Added to Troutnut.com by Troutnut on April 7, 2006

Female Ephemerella subvaria (Hendrickson) Mayfly Dun

View 3 Pictures

Collected May 1, 2004 from the Namekagon River in Wisconsin
Added to Troutnut.com by Troutnut on January 25, 2006

Female Ephemerella subvaria (Hendrickson) Mayfly Dun

View 3 Pictures

Collected May 7, 2005 from the West Branch of the Delaware River in New York
Added to Troutnut.com by Troutnut on May 16, 2006

Male Ephemerella subvaria (Hendrickson) Mayfly Spinner

View 2 Pictures

Collected May 16, 2004 from unknown in Wisconsin
Added to Troutnut.com by Troutnut on January 25, 2006

Specimen Page:1 2 345

Jargon Defined:

Nymphs: The juvenile, underwater stages of mayflies, stoneflies, dragonflies, and damselflies and other aquatic insects whose juvenile stages are covered by hard exoskeletons. The word can also refer to the fishing flies which imitate these creatures, in which case it is used as a blanket term for flies imitating any underwater stage of an invertebrate (except for crayfish and leeches).

A few (not all) of the abdominal tubercles on this Ephemerella needhami nymph are circled. They are especially large in this species.

Tubercles: Various peculiar little bumps or projections on an insect. Their character is important for the identification of many kinds of insects, such as the nymphs of Ephemerellidae mayflies.

Useful References:

Arbona, Fred Jr. 1989. Mayflies, the Angler, and the Trout. Nick Lyons Books.

Caucci, Al and Nastasi, Bob. 2004. Hatches II. The Lyons Press.

Fauceglia, Ted. 2005. Mayflies . Stackpole Books.

Knopp, Malcolm and Robert Cormier. 1997. Mayflies: An Angler's Study of Trout Water Ephemeroptera . The Lyons Press.

Leonard, Justin W. and Fannie A. Leonard. 1962. Mayflies of Michigan Trout Streams. Cranbrook Institute of Science.

Schwiebert, Ernest G. 1955. Matching the Hatch. MacMillan Publishing Company.

Swisher, Doug and Carl Richards. 2000. Selective Trout. The Lyons Press.