Mystery Floaters at Smith Mountain Lake

Brains? Creatures? Fish eggs?

None of the above: Those slimy blobs floating in the lake are bryozoa, invertebrates whose presence indicates a healthy lake. By Laurie Edwards

    They were like something out of a horror film, maybe "The Blob," and they were everywhere.    When Paul and Denise Hegener arrived at their part-time home in The Waterfront a few weeks ago, Denise headed down to the dock to spruce things up and take a swim, but what she saw just beneath the surface stopped her dead in her tracks."I went to go in the water and there were like these huge 'footballs' attached to the ladder," she said. "They were like creatures from the lagoon."
    About four or five football-sized jelly-looking masses were anchored to the swim ladder, along with another six or seven the length of a banana.Hegener said she tried to use a broom to dislodge the creatures, which were hard despite their gelatinous appearance, but they held firm. 
    A neighbor spotted Hegener and told her that the blobs had been at her dock in previous years. 
    Then the woman headed over to help."She came over and started pulling them off with her hands," recalled Hegener. "I wouldn't go near them."
Read this entire article from the Laker Weekly Magazine here.

Learn more about Bryozoa here.

Photo Courtesy of Michiel van der Waaij

While underwater, bryozoa extend tentacles they use to feed on microplankton 

The Bryozoa, also known as Ectoprocta or commonly as moss animals, are a phylum of aquatic invertebrate animals. Typically about 0.5 millimetres (0.020 in) long, they are filter feeders that sieve food particles out of the water using a retractable lophophore, a "crown" oftentacles lined with cilia. Most marine species live in tropical waters, but a few occur in oceanic trenches, and others are found in polarwaters. One class lives only in a variety of freshwater environments, and a few members of a mostly marine class prefer brackish water. Over 4,000 living species are known. One genus is solitary and the rest colonial.

BRFAL Chapter of Virginia Master Naturalist wants you to get outside, explore and learn something new today. Get involved in something cool, learn more about the Virginia Master Naturalist program here! (Don't forget your camera, you never know what you might spot in the wild, or em, on your swim ladder!)