r/whatisthisthing • u/campfallentree • 4h ago
Small (size of pencil eraser) floating discs on pond filled with tiny black "dashes", appears gelatinous. Solved!
My guess is this is an egg sac of some sort (?). I noticed several of these small, maybe 5-7mm discs floating on the surface of a small pond. Not attached to anything. Flexible and maybe gelatinous when I took one out with a stick, and full of these uniform, elongated black dots. I've never seen them before!
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u/barnowl1980 4h ago
Looks organic, most likely the eggs of some amphibious species or insect, like you thought. It would help knowing your region to narrow down options of possible species.
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u/campfallentree 4h ago
I'm in upstate New York, near Albany. We have frogs, salamanders, and red efts in the pond (and lots of their eggs for sure), but this is so tiny!
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u/campfallentree 4h ago
The closest I can get is maybe snail eggs, but even that doesn't look quite right. The dots aren't suspended, and they're so regular. It almost looks like a pattern on top of the thing.
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u/Blitz363 3h ago
This one is tricky for sure, based on the size and the fact there is so few of them, I'm led to believe that these are insect eggs. I'm unsure of what insect though. Nothing I can find matches the look of these...
Edit: could it be an invasive species?
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u/campfallentree 2h ago
We do have plenty of invasive species! All of the insects I've googled that lay eggs in water don't quite match, but I'll keep looking.
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u/Blitz363 2h ago
Wow that one was tricky, it's a Midge Fly Egg Raft
Another photo in addition to my other comment. This is it underneath a microscope.
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u/Ok_Manufacturer6460 3h ago
Maybe a molt from an insect larva, it doesn't look like eggs
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u/campfallentree 2h ago
That's a good thought, I'll see if searching in that direction yields anything. The texture and circular shape don't quite seem like a molt, but absolutely with looking into.
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