The way to keep Slugs off the Hostas

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The common frog, in spite of its name, is not common in many areas of Britain these days. In the intensively farmed countryside the frog has almost completely disappeared. Agricultural sprays, draining wetland habitats and filling-in small ponds that the frogs use as breeding sites, are the main reasons for the frogs’ decline.

However, here in my unpolluted ponds, I have, as every year, more frogs than I know what to do with. I was going to tell you how to cook them, but I think I have teased Kath enough for now.

I have seven ponds, two medium size and five smaller. They overflow into each other in a cascade (when the pump is turned on). The frogs only seem to leave spawn in the two larger ponds, so it probably something to do with the depth of water.

There was plenty of commotion in this pond in the Spring.

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At first the tadpoles eat the remaining egg gel from which they hatched. They then eat submerged vegetable matter whilst absorbing oxygen directly from the water using their gills (fish also use gills to extract oxygen from the water). As they grow in size, lungs will develop inside the tadpoles and they will then begin to visit the surface in order to breathe in some of their oxygen from the air. Eventually the diet becomes more carnivorous as the tadpole will start eating small invertebrates in the water and even each other.

The whole process of change - from tadpole to young frog – takes about 12 weeks

As I always have loads of spawn, I put some in a separate container to help ensure a few survive.

One February the ponds froze over and that must have killed off a lot.

Later on the Blackbirds sit on the rocks picking out the eggs!

It's a real struggle to become a tadpole.

Having a few in a container,

means I can photograph them more easily as well.

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A young frog, still with a tail. Taken last week.

And this weekend the little frogs all ready to go.

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Once they try to climb out, I catch them and release them into one of the smaller and shallower ponds. The pump will not be turned on for a few more weeks so that they get time to hop off.

The only noticeable difference from the adults is the size, the young froglets are about 1cm in length, compared to around 8cm for a fully grown adult. It will take three years for the young froglets to reach their full size. Of all the tadpoles that emerged from their gelatinous egg cases back in early March, only a very small proportion of them have actually made it to the stage of leaving the water. Most will have been eaten by other animals or succumbed to disease during the four month period of development in their freshwater habitat.

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