Things change fast this time of year. One moment it feels like summer, the next like deepest winter. New migrants arrive every day. One morning this week I found that the muddy area by the gate in the horses’ field had morphed overnight into a thriving colony of common frogs. What had been a marshy, trampled patch of wet ground was now heaving with life; the standing water had become a thick broth of frogspawn, gelatinous and quivering in an unhealthy khaki green.
At first I couldn’t see the frogs themselves, but as I clattered by, headcollar in hand, they revealed themselves: glossy and dark, palm-sized, moving with deliberate slowness, concealed up to their necks.
Though disturbed, they were reluctant to leave the pool if I didn’t pose an immediate threat. Some lifted their heads to watch for movement, their eyes glassy and gold-rimmed, expressionless. Others clambered laboriously over one another in a half-hearted effort to get away, turning their leopard-spotted backs to me, fat thighs glistening in the April sun.
This was a foul gathering. Nearby, a fat plastic pipe protruded from a bank, trickling drainage water from the upper fields. Green algae feathered the edges. Some kind soul from the stables had made an attempt to dam the pool with rocks, containing most of the water and the frogs out of the path of the horses’ clumsy hooves. Still, to my eyes it seemed neither a safe nor salubrious spot to bring up one’s children.
Never mind. The frogs will soon be gone, leaving the tadpoles to cope alone, as they always do. Last year I watched through my fingers as a batch of tadpoles squirmed and writhed in a ditch at the edge of the golf course. They faced a nail-biting race against time – those who could not metamorphose in time would suffocate and die as the water evaporated around them.
But frogs have evolved to deal with exactly these conditions. If tadpoles sense their puddle to be drying out, they will rapidly assume form as tiny froglets, days ahead of schedule. It’s a hard life, and many won’t make it. But though it might be tempting to move them to a “more suitable” location, it’s best not to interfere. Ugly it may be, but the frogs know what they’re doing.
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