"K30a" wrote in message
...

Row, Row, Row Your Bug
Colorful Experiments Solve Water Strider Mystery: Their Middle Legs Serve
as
Oars
By Guy Gugliotta
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, August 7, 2003; Page A06
Scientists have deciphered the mystery of how the tiny water strider -- a
familiar denizen of your local pond -- gets around: It uses its middle set
of
legs as oars and rows along the water's surface at a rate of almost 31/2
feet
per second.
In a series of colorful experiments reported in today's issue of the
journal
Nature , a team of researchers led by Massachusetts Institute of
Technology
mathematician John W.M. Bush used high-speed video and blue-dyed water to
track
striders as they darted past the camera, leaving vortices as neat as those
made
by a sculler in a boat race.

My smart-a$$ nephew said the other day, "If they only swim, how'd they get
to your pond?" Little punk.

BV.