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Tag Archives: frogs

Alas, poor frogs!

08 Tuesday Jan 2013

Posted by marytheherb in Pond, Wildlife

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frogs, pond conservation

Last week I ventured out into the sodden garden after a few days of drier weather. Walking around by the pond I was horrified to see 7 dead, bloated, frogs floating in the water. I have seen one or two like this after a cold patch, when the pond freezes over, but not more. We wondered if it was our radical clearing out of the pond in October that had somehow left them vulnerable.

The pond before clearingpond sept

The naked pond – although still some submerged floating plants

pind dec 2012

Having taken advice from the organisation called Pond Conservation, it seems that we wouldn’t have done much harm with our clear-out, quite the reverse really. It is most likely that they did suffer when there was a cold snap a week or two before Christmas and then took their time to float to the top of the pond. I hadn’t tried to keep a patch of water clear of ice this season, so I must remember to do this in the future in order to prevent any build-up of noxious gases. I really do hate my frogs to be hurt!

Slugs rule ok!

07 Saturday Jul 2012

Posted by marytheherb in Gardening, Pond, Vegetable gardening, Wildlife

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frogs, slugs

You may not have believed my last post when I commented on the disastrous vegetable situation this year so I am posting some pictures of the damage, almost entirely due to the slugs, although pigeons are not wholly without blame, and the weather started things off badly and ensured the plants were poor specimens and ready to be attacked. (Click on the first two photos for larger slugs!)

Broad bean brunch

Radish relish

Pathetic peas

Calamatous cabbages (note potato intruder)

Paltry potatoes

I have been fighting a brave battle on the strawberry front and we have had plenty of lovely fruit, but yesterday’s rain re-inforced slug numbers and I am giving up there too.

I suppose I should say that I don’t use slug pellets because we have a couple of ponds and there are loads of frogs hopping about the garden and they come first. Frogs are having a hard time over the planet and I am trying to make their lives as easy as possible here, so I suppose there will be the odd year when I really pay for that strategy.

Looking forward to next year now. It can’t be this bad can it?

The wild garden

07 Monday May 2012

Posted by marytheherb in Wildlife

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Tags

butterflies, frogs, ponds, wildlife

March being pleasantly warm there were quite a few butterflies around. The brimstone is always the first about in the spring and a very welcome sight. This year we also saw quite a few peacock butterflies. I hope the cold weather in April has not been too bad for them.

Peacock butterfly sunning itself on the path

The frogs had their usual sex fest (it always seems a little later in this garden than others) and left masses of frogspawn. About two weeks ago there was still mostly a squirming mass of hatched tadpoles on top of the water lily but now they have all gone, and looking yesterday I couldn’t see a single one swimming about.  Something similar happened last year and I can’t tell where they are going. In previous years there have been tadpoles and small frogs galore. There are various predators in the pond, of course, including newts and dragonfly larva but I can’t believe they could have taken all of the tadpoles by now. Are they hiding or has something else happened to them, I wonder?  

Happy frogs, I hope!

The larger pond has probably given me more pleasure than any other part of the garden. Particularly when new here, I spent hours watching pond life. It is so charming to see what seems like a whole other world. It looks delightful but it is a nasty world of predations. One year I spent some time catching water boatmen and flinging them into the undergrowth, believing that they were too numerous and fearful for my tadpoles. I found out later they could fly. Now I leave well alone. To protect the aquatic wildlife I never use chemicals anywhere near the pond.

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