Puddle

A puddle, also pool ( Austrian paints, Low German also partially dud, Swiss German Glungge or Gunte ) is a collection of fluids - mostly water - on the surface, for example, forms after a rain and a few days later seeps or evaporates is. Puddles are the smallest form of standing water.

The word puddle ( ahd pfuzza, puzza; ndd. Putte, . Ndl put) is borrowed from the Latin puteus for " pit, fountain".

For the individual traffic (eg pedestrians) are puddles on roads as impairments. Therefore routes are paved or asphalted as far as possible. Also in green areas, such as lawns and pastures, one tries to bulldoze sinks as well as small bumps. For children puddles offer playing facilities.

Ecologically provide water puddles temporary small water biotopes dar. Antoni van Leeuwenhoek discovered around 1668, that puddles contained in the microscopic range life. For many small organisms, such as insects, sinks provide coolness, moisture and water, while surveys provide more sunlight and a few degrees Celsius more heat. In deeper forest puddles in particular thrive salamanders and newts or rest on their walks. For birds puddles are drinking and bathing. Swallows use moist clay from puddles for her nest. One reason for the decline of the Barn Swallow is also the disappearance of the puddles from the landscape, which was due to the expansion of agricultural roads ( service roads ) carried out in the context of the structural promotion of the European Union or measures of collectivization.

Puddles tend to become larger and more permanent ( self-reinforcement ). The standing water soaked the ground, while driving through the puddle muddy water is splashed, and coarser soil constituents remain in the environment. The puddle is deeper and larger. In addition to flow fine clay particles with the water back into the puddle and seal these towards the ground more and more from so that the water in the puddle can barely seep.