Spawn

Within days of our cleaning out the swamp, the frogs arrived for their annual mating spree. It happens every spring - we spend three sleepless nights listening to the frogs partying down outside our bedroom window.

B has been known to go out and break up the party by rounding up all the frogs he can find, putting them in a paper sack and releasing them into the wet-weather creek that runs through the center of our neighborhood. I refer to it as the Amphibian Liberation Organization and joke that the next morning there's always a line of frogs hopping up the street back to our pond.


I went out earlier this week, after a particularly raucous night, and found strings of frog spawn draped all over the pond plants. Those things in the water that look like ropes with white dots (click to embiggen) - those are hundreds and hundreds of frog eggs. Soon, we'll have tadpoles, and I hope this year's groups survives better than last year's. They didn't do so well.

I really don't want to have our little pond overrun with frogs, but given that amphibians in general are having a rough time of it, I'm glad we can provide a suitable habitat for them.


As long as they don't throw any more loud parties.