Animals I saw during my Aquatic Biology course

Quite possibly the angriest animal met all year. As soon as my professor saw it, he ran into that muck you see in the background(which in some places was deep enough to pull your entire foot in) and grabbed him. Also, I can assure you, that is the safest way to hold a snapping turtle, both for the handler and the turtle. Holding them by their legs is fine, so long as you don't hold them by the tail. We held him for maybe 20 seconds to get the picture then set him down. He kinda hissed at us before walking maybe 2 feet away and burying himself in the muck. By the time we left, he had completely submerged himself, which was interesting to watch.

The aforementioned angry snapper, moments before he began sinking into the muck.

Dragonfly larvae if I'm not mistaken. These guys were literally everywhere when we were drop netting. You should thank them for their service, as they are the main reason mosquitoes don't swarm around temporary ponds. These little guys are the alpha predators of the puddle.

Slithery and cute, but also very angry because we almost stepped on him. He was just sunbathing in the middle of the trail. After we put him down he glared at us for a while before making a break for it.

Another angry dude who got pissed at us for disturbing his peaceful napping spot...directly in the middle of a common running path. We slid him off to the side just in case.

A big ol' tadpole. Don't worry, we put all of them back. There was even a middle school fieldtrip happening nearby so we got to show some kids a bunch of tadpoles and frogs.

This little guy was fished out of a pond and actually posed for us. We thank him for his patience.

Some cute little Two-lined Salamanders IIRC. These guys are everywhere if you know where to look. Under rocks near the edges of streams, yet not in running water. Careful when handling though as they do secrete toxins. Nothing dangerous enough to get through your skin, but make sure you don't rub your eyes after holding one.

What a photogenic frog.

The pudgiest newt you ever saw. I wanna say it's a spotted newt, but can't say for certain. I'll probably just use the general term salamander.

Newt making a break for it.

Just for everyone's peace of mind: We made sure to release everything we caught(even the little bugs we fished out with nets) and put them all back under the rocks we found them in the case of newts/salamanders. We were doing a survey to assess species diversity in streams of varying urbanization levels. Photos are a courtesy of all of my classmates as our professor wanted to thoroughly document our field trips.