Date: Wed, 16 Nov 1994 01:02:16 -0500

From: Mike Agnes by971[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]CLEVELAND.FREENET.EDU

Subject: mayfly



Mark Ingram maingr01[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]ukcc.uky.edu inquires:



Now what do you undertand by the term mayfly?



DARE records "Canadian soldier" as a northern Ohio

term for mayfly. Local informants here (mostly over

45) confirm they know the term but haven't seen

need to use it in recent years. Our files contain

citations dating from the 1970s and 1980s. But

mayflies in northern Ohio have decreased remarkably

in the past decade and a half, supposedly as the

result of changing water conditions along Lake Erie's

shores. Such changes are said to have begun reversing

in the last few years, and an increase in the mayfly

population has already been noticed, so maybe the

current younger generation will have to "revive"

the word.

From elsewhere, see the following citation:



"Except to fish and fishermen and Ephemerida of the

opposite sex, the Green Bay fly or Canadian soldier or

American soldier is an unmitigated pest. The town of

Green Bay straddles the Fox River where it empties into

the waters of Green Bay at its southernmost tip. The

Green Bay fly breeds along the marshy shores of the bay.

He is either too light or two lazy to fly against

the wind but once in a while, not necessarily every

summer, conditions are just right when a hatch comes on.

Or just wrong from the Green Bay Sanitation Department's

point of view."

-- New York Times, 28 May 1979



Mike Agnes

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