There are many river or freshwater animals, but we don’t always know their names and characteristics. Compared to the sea, rivers and lakes are a bit neglected, and with them all that fauna and flora that live near these areas with water. The opportunity has come to learn more about those who populate these environments with many names and to have a few close encounters with those species that have intrigued us the most.
Animals that live near rivers
There are many river animals, they coexist in the surroundings of these strips of running water but to meet them in an orderly way and not confuse their characteristics we have decided to proceed by categories.
Reptiles
Reptiles are perhaps the ones that scare us the most because we have crocodiles in mind but for a moment let’s leave aside this image that is not very suitable to the moment and without prejudice let’s go and discover what river reptiles are. We can meet for example the frog, or rather the many types of frog that exist , and also the newt, the curious salamander and the sweet European tortoise but also the terrible grass snake that certainly does not arouse much sympathy already from the name. The most interesting river reptile for us is certainly the slow worm.
Have you ever heard of it?
Well this little animal is a lizard even if most people classify it as a snake because of its way of gaining ground, since it is not equipped with limbs. It is a lizard but evolving over the centuries it has lost its legs, but it still has the “ability” to break the thing that is over 50% of its body. When it is escaping from danger, as a technique it uses that of abandoning its tail there on the spot to escape quickly leaving the predator a bit confused. Compared to snakes, our slow worm also has another peculiarity, eyelids that close, and then a smaller number of vertebrae and a more robust skin. We can also meet the slow worm in Italy, near the Alps, and also in nearby France, in the South-east
Invertebrates
Let’s move on to invertebrates and there are so many animals in this category around rivers , so many that can sometimes bother us or scare us or shock us. Here, let’s try not to be influenced by the idea of insects that we have and let’s go and discover these animals that, by the way, are not all insects.
Among the river animals that belong to this family we certainly find the freshwater shrimp , large and therefore also very easy to spot if we search in the rivers. Around instead we find other types of invertebrates such as dragonflies, diptera and ephemenoptera, the water spider, the ditiscus and the caddisfly. And then another large number of creatures including spiders, worms, earthworms, beetles , hymenoptera of various types. Some are splendid, they are almost perfect creatures that seem made on purpose to live near the river, to be studied
Birds
Even if there is water flowing near us, we look up for a moment to admire the freshwater birds. Or we close our eyes and try to hear the noises they make, learning to know some of their calls if I’m not asking too much. There are bird watching programs that can teach us to do it while having fun and being in the middle of nature.
That said, let’s go back to the river to discover some birds that love this type of environment and see the river itself as an interesting source of food. Usually, river birds are expert swimmers both on the surface and under water, they are equipped with soft and thick feathers that are at the same time able to make them waterproof and keep them warm. They also have fantastic webbed feet that, just like sea birds, act as oars.
There are some species that pass by and go, migrants, others that are sedentary, we can mention some that we all probably know such as ducks, geese, storks, swans, buntings and kingfishers.
Let’s focus on the last one, the Kingfisher because it is a very interesting bird and it also lives in our area, in southern Italy, as well as in north-western Africa, southern and eastern Spain and Corsica. Among the distinctive features that make this bird unmistakable are its plumage, shaded with turquoise and emerald green on the back, while on the chest it appears orange, and then its eating habits . Yes, if you happen to spot one, try to pay attention, it has its own tactic to capture prey. It stays still for hours, perched near the water, and then suddenly dives as soon as it has spotted a potential prey. Don’t imagine a colossal bird because it is a little being of 40 grams , but capable of swallowing prey relatively larger than itself by pecking at it insistently on a stone it finds near the river.
River fish: list
We leave the fish for last and make only a representative list because it would have been rather banal to bore you with a series of fish talking about river animals, here are the most significant ones.
- Trout
- Carp
- Tench
- Char
- Pike
- Catfish
- Eel
- Capitone
- Perch
- Agone
- Sturgeon
- Grayling
- Torpedo
River and lake flora
Let’s not forget the flora around the river because it too is special and deserves to be admired and studied. In the surroundings of both the rivers and the lakes we find trees such as the White Willow, the Weeping Willow , the Alder, the White Poplar. There are also the fascinating White Water Lily, the beautiful rush and the classic reed . The latter is a cosmopolitan plant that we can find precisely in marshy places. It is composed of many erect stems, with a round section, hollow, up to 3 meters high that produce between July and September, in summer, an inflorescence typical of grasses.