Are these tadpoles....?

Question

In my backyard in a box where there is rainwater, there are little tiny TINY things that seem like tadpoles. There are tons of them. They swim around super fast and some have long thin tails when some are chubby with a smaller tail. They can't be more than 2 or 3 millimeters. In the box there a weird things like shedded skin from the tiny creatures. The chubbier ones seem to have antennas & black eyes if you look REALLY close. What are these things?

Answer 1

These aren't tadpoles. These are nymphs. They are the larval stage of dragonflies, mosquitos, damselfies, etc. Eggs were laid into the water and little tiny aquatic baby dragonflies hatched out. They shed their skins, and after a while, they will climb onto something out of the water and shed their skins one last time and underneath will be a young adult-stage dragonfly. You should probably pour out the water (to kill them) because they may be mosquito nymphs.

Answer 2

i don't think there tadpoles it takes about 10 days for frog eggs to fertilize

Answer 3

if you know that there are frogs in your pond they could be... but the could be mosquitoes as well.. if they are black when small and as they get larger turn to a brownish green colour.. (kind of like pickles) then they are tadpoles

Answer 4

They don't sound like tadpoles. Are they black?

Could be mosquito larvae?

Answer 5

Are you sure they arent baby mosquitos? Oh gosh, i hope they're not..

If its in rainwater.. and you dont have a pond or lake near your house.. Then i dont think they are tadpoles.  

Answer 6

Sounds more like mosquito larvae.

Free fish food :-)

Ian

Answer 7

Tadpoles, baby frogs, vary in size by type and age.  That is large frogs produce larger tadpoles, and older tadpoles are larger due to growth.  Below are links to pictures of tadpoles and pictures of mosquito larvae.  As you can see they are similar.  The mosquito larvae tend to be much smaller, though.  Although your water creatures might be frogs, odds are greater that they are mosquitoes.