Out on the river can be quite an adventure.  Today was  a doozy so it has surpassed the threshold that actually requires that I blog about it.  So after a tremendous day of amphibian hunting yesterday (30 toads in less than an hour), we headed out on the river to find more amphibians.  No big deal.  I have gone out on the river 5-6 times and nothing happened.  

Well we search for hours and find not a single toad.  Let me rephrase that, we cannot CATCH a single amphibian.  Heard a Cricket frog laughing at us... even saw a Leopard frog twice but it was gone in a second.  We keep driving in the boat and are all looking at a poten

tial spot for toads.  Then out of nowhere, I hear a huge splash.  I am thinking something is wrong with the boat, and then something large smacks me in the thigh.  My heart is racing only to discover a huge fish had JUMPED INTO THE BOAT!  After spending a full day out on the lake trying to catch fish with my brother, randomly a fish jumps into my boat!  I have no idea what kind of fish this is... so let me know if you happen to know.  

I just know it is an ugly fish.  So, after that choas  we pull up to a sweet spot with lawn chairs on a beach and find a couple toads.  Here is my favorite shot of one.  

We swab those guys for disease and decide to call it a day since Thunderstorms are threatening.  So I have my new Masters student drive the boat over to where I am at.  Apparently, she had never driven a boat before that moment.  No, she didn't lose the boat or anything crazy.  She just took awhile to get it over there.  And it was only a couple feet of water deep at points so it was a challenge to navigate.  I lounged in the lawn chair while hearing the engine rev up a bit too high at times.  Whatever.  She'll learn.  She gets close enough, and we jump in the boat.  I start crossing the river to the deep end and am cruising along and the engine dies.  Weird.  So I try to restart it.  It goes for about 30 seconds then dies again.  Sweet.  Mind you we have not seen a single boat on this stretch of the river the entire day.  I am stuck.  I call a grad student to come rescue us, but he is 2 hours away.  I call another grad student who comes to our rescue.  Of course we are waiting on the river for an hour for him to arrive.  I turn on the weather radio.  "Late Afternoon thunderstorms expected with heavy rains and quarter sized hail.  Potential for tornados to develop."  I turn off the weather radio.  Finally, the grad students arrive.  Apparently, there is a water port that spits out water to cool the engine and it was plugged from all the burnouts in the mud.  They brought a nifty air compressor and blew it out.  After that, no problems.  I high tailed it home.  Tonight was date night, and I was to not be late.  So I arrived home 15 min before the babysitter coated in sweat and suntan lotion.  A quick shower and all was good.  Just a regular day catching frogs.