They will wander around out of the water.

Before the disease wiped out all of the toads we would occasionally have a toad or other creature in our window wells. There is no reason that a crayfish would not fall in but many can burrow into the dirt. I did have flat thin boards propped up in my window wells so that anything that fell in could climb out. You would not want to use a board that is heavy enough to break a window just wide enough for a nimble creature to walk or hop on.

Took a wrong turn on his way back to New Orleans??? :)

I realized that crayfish sometimes wander out of the water, but it's like 100 feet from the water and the window well has a raise ridge,so the crayfish will have to climb a foot.

I do get a lot of toads falling into the well. I fish them out and put them in the area of the garden that I have bug problems. A rather large toad lives underneath the central air unit. I have to mow the lawn carefully.

If I put a piece of lumber in the well, would the toads be able to climb out? Do I need to use a rough tree branch.

Paul

I've had crawfish in my yard, an its at least 100' from the creek, so they could even be living your yard. Maybe something like a coon or a cat took it there to eat?
Paul.....toads and frogs can jump out of really tall areas. But if you're worried (and they're really small), I'd just put a thick branch for them to climb out on. That's what I do in my little water garden. But I've seen them just spring out of the water on their own!

The dead toad bodies I have found in the window wells were fround in the spring. Probably dug a burrow for the winter then did not have enough strength to jump the almost 3 ft to get out. Of course this was also about the time all of them died off so not certain the ones I found were healthy to begin with. But now they have a way to climb out.

I am constantly removing toads from my window well. I do not mind this, but the toads are really hard to spot.

Why can't you fit some screening over the well so that the critters can fall in?

....so that critters CAN'T fall in.....

;-)

Way back when I was in Ag school at Ohio State some of the farmer/students told me that they could find crayfish in the middle of a cleared field. I thought that they were pulling my leg until I actually found some myself in a corn field. Turns out crayfish can follow and underground stream and burrow up to the surface whereever. Your observation is not unusual.

I do have a screen, but they somehow still fall through. I guess I need to replace the screen with a finer one. My neighbor has plexiglass screen, which seemed like a better idea.

Paul