Nope.....just driftwood. It looked old and waterlogged. They probably see it suspended just off the bottom somewhat neutrally buoyant and they hit it thinking its fish, bug, hatchery pellet, etc.... These were dumb hatchery fish.
Some snail trivia. Snails are a common trout food. Any fish that eats crustaceans will eat snails especially bluegills and yellow perch. When I reclaimed my pond there were no fish or minnows left in it but the areas with springs and the section that had Ball Pond Brook running through it were loaded with an aquatic snail plus some other invertebrates. I flooded the pond in October 1991 and immediately stocked 50 small rainbows and 50 small brookies. I had no idea what they would have to eat but during the ice fishing season I caught a few and they looked very healthy. At ice-out I went out with the fly rod and caught a half dozen and kept one brookie and one rainbow for dinner. They were fat and healthy and their stomachs were filled full of tiny snails. Without any predators to eat the snail larvae the snail population exploded over the winter and the trout fed almost exclusively on them getting very fat. The calcium in the snail shell gave both species a bright orange flesh and made them very tasty. If I was building a pond that could support trout I would immediately, upon filling it up, stocked snails, scuds, sow bugs, a low growing weed like Elodea and super charge the water with some manure/hay combo. I would let them be the only food in the pond for a year and then the second year add fathead minnows which are small and will not be a predator of the larger zoo planktons or invertebrate larvae but stay shallow, feeds on a lot of phyto planktons and provides a meat meal for the trout. Now the trout have a variety of foods to eat and will thrive. Though I have never seen a snail fly pattern there is a snail "hatch" of sorts. At times, snails will somehow "inflate" themselves and float to the surface and disperse themselves in the surface film. This may be a way to survive flooding where being in deep water is no good for them and this allows them to be wind blown into shallow shore areas of their preference. I am sure that at times like this they are an easy meal for all kinds of fish species.
Well we have all been edified.thankyou buck.my college major was freshwater biology and I minored in becoming a licensed electrician (summers /holidays etc.) My school was murray state.ky lake was our prime study.trout were not on the menu...haha.I did see a lot of prey species feeding on snails and as you stated it was seasonal.never knew brookies would eat them.makes complete sense on a nutritional level.aparently and inadvertenly I started a thread for all of us who like to eat our catch.wise management is sometimes preferable to blind catch and release.cant do much damage keeping a couple of bull gills or a few crappie.
So now I am supposed to apologize because I made an observation about my pond and how it evolved? This is an open forum website so deal with it. If you don't like my style of writing put me on ignore.
Very informative all!! Years ago when smoking was more common in society, the board of fish and game issued an advisory to fisherman not to throw their cigarette butts in the water as trout were found to be ingesting them and this was believed to block their digestive tract. Filters were made from spun something or other and wouldn't biodegrade and filtered cigarettes were becoming very popular.