First frogs

Little Pond

Another warm night has begun.
I step into my tall wading boots, slip under the cover of a long dark jacket, and ease beneath the slender strap of the light which will hang from my shoulder. At my hip this large beam will freely swing, slung like a purse, as I walk hands-free exploring the edge of Little Pond in the hours approaching midnight. My final garment-- the heavy winter hat, one that would appear to be far more than is needed on this evening late in March, I casually stuff into one gaping pocket. For it is warm and mild, a night lit in moonlight revealing a faded field bathed in a mist, thick and welcome on my face.
I step out into the night, where from across the yard, the frogs are calling.

Spring Peeper, male calling

Like distant sleigh bells, the ring of spring peepers drawn to the basin of Little Pond sounds sweet and gentle, a light dusting of sound floating with ease on the heavy night air. I walk with each step, closer, down the path. And my light reveals the sudden retreat of hundreds of night crawlers, each shrinking back into its small hole as my footsteps approach their 8 to 10-inch emergence onto the lawn. In this warm and damp night, they have risen to revel amidst the short dew-studded grass before tunneling deep, beyond the reach of any summer drought. From the woods beyond Little Pond, a barred owl calls, and calls again.
I cross the berm into the shallow water of this vernal pool, 30 feet across and almost perfectly round. The sweet ring from small frogs mounts now with such volume that above it no other sound is heard. From my pocket, I retrieve the heavy hat and tug it snuggly down, covering my ears—a muffler against the din that has become an almost painful roar.
With a sweep of my light in a wide arc from side to side across the pool, the tiny tree frogs are hushed in an instant, surprised into a silence that quickly fades. In seconds, the first brave soul perched and projecting from a blade of grass, calls out into the night once more.
And the uproar begins again.

Spring Peeper breeding pair in amplexus
(smaller male clasping larger female as she lays eggs)

Wood Frogs' eye shine across Little Pond

In the beam of my light, the eyes of wood frogs return a golden glow as they float motionless across the darkened surface. Their quacking call, as if half dog, half duck, gathers them here from the woods yards away to breed in the waters of Little Pond. Large, ruddy females, eagerly clasped by the small, dark males, have already left compact clumps of eggs, golf ball-sized dark orbs, which by morning will have swelled to the size of grapefruits. Communal egg masses, gelatinous rafts several feet across will stretch to cover this quiet corner, moored to first-growing grass at the edge of Little Pond.

Wood Frog breeding pair

Wood Frog eggs

Wood Frogs leaving eggs in communal egg masses

Northern Leopard Frog breeding pair

Northern Leopard Frog pair in amplexus

Northern Leopard Frog eggs

Leopard frogs, too, large, but barely seen as the dark brown and green of their bodies blends with the tangle of grass at the edge, call to one another in a low, ticking snore.
These first frogs of spring, at any other time buried in the depths of the woods or under the cover of tall field grass, now stare back at me from the cool water of Little Pond. With my light, I have stepped into their darkened world.

Spring Peeper and Northern Leopard Frog
(for size comparison)

On a warm, spring night

On a warm, spring night, I stand,
under darkness brought by the clouds, heavy with rain,
feet touching cool water, clear and still,
to hear the hundreds of small voices,
propped just above the water’s surface.

Spring Peeper, Pseudacris crucifer

Clinging to small stems,
toes strongly wrapping,
or broadly floating ahead of each step,
with eyes that glow like jewels from across the pool,
they welcome me with song
into their midnight madness.

Northern Leopard Frog, Rana pipiens

Wood Frog, Rana sylvatica

In all these others,
there is but one that is silent,
watching me,
with the gentle face
and sweet, small velvet feet
that I adore.


They have come home.

Spotted Salamander, Ambystoma maculatum, male
Little Pond Pool, Butlerville Ohio
March 5, 2009

See more Camera Critters here!

The Fast and Furious Rain

December is a difficult month.
The bright, clean snows blanketing much of the country, are absent in southern Ohio, where clouded skies bring us, instead, rain.
And, for months, only shades of gray hang above the brown fields.

I work hard to keep an attitude of cheer, especially with Christmas just days away. But even I find it hard to keep joy in such gloom.

Beyond my window, Goldfinches, now in their olive drab, nestle close to the trunk of our Hawthorn—a cluster of vines wrapped densely about it, their shelter from a fast and furious rain.

Much, indeed, most of what I love has gone.
Against the white sky, the dark shapes of bare branches reveal empty nests where the colorful birds, in reds and yellows and blues, were once hidden behind summer’s green.
The surface of the pond has become quiet and still.
And even the milkweed patch, once teeming with every winged or walking insect, stands dry and withered—its few remaining seeds, waiting for the next breeze.
It would seem that with the end of the year, has come the end of it all.


Across the field, beneath tumbling clouds pushed by a strong wind, I went to the vernal pool—where, last spring, Spotted salamanders gathered to dance beneath its cool water on a dark, moonless night.
And wood frogs sang the first notes of spring’s great chorus.
Sending the next generation out, from water to woods, the last days of summer dried it, and, as it should, left it empty and waiting.

For four months I have waited, too, as brown grasses and faded leaves have filled the dry basin.
Wondering when water would return.
And the pools, again, start their cycle.

First water in Little Pond Pool

December 17, 2008

In this time of so many endings, today, it has happened.
The first drops of cool water, left standing, still clearly there.

Now beginning, even as all else ends.

First Water in Wood Pool
December 17, 2009

From the archives

Spring 2008
Little Pond Pool, full

Spotted Salamander returning to Little Pond Pool
March 2008

Success with salamanders

This entry documents the final chapter of my experiences with Jefferson Salamanders. For previous entries, begin here.

“How many times do I have to tell you? Stop putting everything you find in your mouth!”

You’d think they’d have the sense to know food from non-food, but my little salamanders seem to explore their world by mouthing it.
Not a problem, as long as you can spit out what you don’t like.
A serious problem, if you can’t.

Last week, I peeked in the tank one morning to find two of the crew had something stuck, as in “hopelessly lodged,” in their mouths. One, in such a way that it prevented him from opening his mouth at all; the other--one preventing him from closing it. A sticky matter, indeed!


The seeds of the Nodding Bur-Marigold float at the surface, their back-curved barbs like fishhooks in tender skin. Apparently mistaken for food, they’d been gulped—and would go neither up nor down.


In a small bowl of water on the kitchen table, I operated on my 2-inch long patients—with a pair of tweezers and the utmost concentration. Barely restraining them until I could get a grip on the bur, then working it gently loose. Minutes later, they were swimming once again in the tank.
And, of course, hungry for breakfast.
A small mark, the only reminder of the nasty, spiny encounter.




This weekend, on a cool rainy evening, I released them back to Wood pool--the few Jefferson Salamander larvae, still with bright, smiling faces. (and several Wood Frog tadpoles)



At 45 days since hatching, they’re soon to metamorphose—lose gills, crawl out onto land, and begin their adult lives, underground. They’ll return to this very same pool for only a few days each spring to breed, reuniting with others of their kind in the icy March waters, before leaving eggs behind.
I wanted to be sure they came to know this pool as their home. And completed the cycle of life in these waters. This is their ancestral pool.



How far they’ll wander from here is unknown.
And how they navigate the distance for their return each spring is also unknown.
But one thing is certain—on a rainy night in late February, under a pitch-black sky--with my flashlight, I’ll be watching.
Waiting to welcome them home.

Research conducted in Indiana in 1970,
calculated the rate of survival for this species in the wild,
from hatching to metamorphosis to be 0.7% (less than one percent).



Thanks to Mrs. Nesbit for hosting ABC Wednesday!

Rain

It’s hard to imagine, after last summer’s drought, that a rainy spring could be anything but wonderful. So many suffered in the dryness. And with spring growth, a season’s loss can be repaired.
But even for me, amphibian-loving, frog-watcher that I’ve become—this rain is too much.

Last week I arrived home from work to find a tree had swallowed my front yard. It had disappeared under the boughs of a locust.
A Leaning Locust, native to the Ozarks and southern Appalachians, one of many, persistently sprouting from every corner of my yard.
Eyeing small buildings on which they may, someday, fall.

It never seemed so large--standing by the porch, as it had for years. But, sprawled out, face down across the lawn like a waiter catching his toe on the carpet—he’s wiped out everything in his path. Cherry tree… lilac bush…
The porch is unharmed.
The softened ground, a mound—one taut root, its lifeline.

There he lay, as it continued to rain.
Until, finally, a dry day for cleanup.


And more rain.

I put on my spotted boots and trudge across the pasture, days overdue for mowing. The grass is, in places, almost knee deep.
The tractor, in the barn, still sleepy from winter’s dampness, refuses to tackle the green, wet mess.


Tractor pneumonia.
A coughing, glassy-eyed machine—we cover it and let it rest. Maybe it will get better.

I’m headed to the Wood pool, to bring a bucket of fresh water back to my tank.
The path at the edge is flooded.
The cool, rising water within has found a way out.


In the small clear streams flowing past my toes, Wood frog tadpoles scramble, frantically, upstream. Swept in the current from the surface of their quiet pool--into these leafy hollows, from which there will be no return.
Trapped beyond the edges of their home, they’re doomed.

Soon, it will be time to return the growing salamanders from the tank to the Wood pool, also—to become wild, again. And free.

I feed them a snack before heading upstairs to bed.


A small foot touches my finger and crawls into my hand.
Safe, for now.


The rains pound against the tin roof.

Last September, we were 12 inches below average in rainfall.
This spring, we are over 6 inches above average.

For the journey of my Jefferson Salamanders,
now 42 days old,
please click here.




Thanks to Mrs. Nesbit for hosting ABC Wednesday!

Another place at the table

Our table for four serves another purpose now.
With just 2 of us home, the ample room quickly fills with every seasonal project--from taxes to owl pellets.
And because I crave more than a passing glance at so much of what is outside my door, often, assorted "guests" are invited in--to occupy the empty space, where children sat for dinner years ago.

This spring, it's an aquarium--ten gallons of amber water borrowed from the wood pool.
Filled with tadpoles and salamander larvae--and all their dinner favorites.
There's a small bubbler in one corner that hums more than I'd like, but oxygen is important to these tiny growing guests.
The Jefferson salamander larvae have external gills--absorbing oxygen easily from the water, as they sit, motionless, hidden in algae, waiting for prey to swim past.

With a sudden GULP, a tiny daphnia or copepod is drawn in--and he waits again--the predator.



The wood frog tadpoles' gills have become internal now, as in fish, water passing through them as they swim around the pool, grazing here and there.

Little eating machines--with voracious appetites. Already, they've quadrupled in size.

Who knows how long they'll stay--but for the moment, they're dining with us.

The wetter, the better

I'm finding that rain is nice.

What would, any other year, be a reason to stay indoors and wish for sunny skies' return, has become an invitation to go out.
Over the puddled pasture, now lush green tufts of tender field grasses, I step slowly along.
The water's chill felt through my boots on dry, warm toes inside.

No wood frogs tonight--only peepers and chorus frogs. The coppery adults, who floated, days earlier, effortlessly on the surface of wood pool, have silently gone.
But their eggs have come to life.

By the hundreds and thousands, the tadpoles cluster upon the bright green, algae-filled gelatinous masses. In writhing huddles, they wriggle.
Their safety, each other.


Now, the race begins.
To leave, as all wood frogs do--
before summer empties this pool.

Fresh eggs in the morning

I sometimes feel as though I have the front row seat to a drama unfolding in our vernal pool.
I've read the playbill, understand the plot summary, but struggle with a bit of uncertainty as to exactly who's who. And to further confuse things, the story stops and starts, as spring falters and late storms freeze the "action" on the stage.

Twelve days ago, 2 types of egg masses appeared. Matching them to the adults frolicking in the same waters and their similar timing, I identified them as wood frogs' and spotted salamanders' eggs.

This morning, a new character has made an appearance--an egg mass unlike any of the many, now developing gelatinous clusters from days ago. Fresh and clear, smaller and more dense.
Could it be that these are the Spotteds' eggs? And the original ones were Jefferson's?
I thought I had missed them!

Perhaps Act II will reveal more answers.

Wood Frog eggs showing embryos.
Wood pool,
March 25, 2008

First photo,
Spotted Salamander eggs with cleavage furrow?
Wood pool,
March 25, 2008