Wood frog eggs (revisited)

What: Wood frog (Lithobates sylvaticus) eggs in a small side pond along Wool Pullery Brook. 

Ecological notes: Our cold weather the other night left a thin sheet of ice. The eggs above the water line froze and collapsed the next day when the weather warmed up. You can see this on the photo on the right. The other eggs seem to still be fine, though haven't shown much sign of development since I first spotted them (March 23rd).

Where: This little pond exists because the beavers dammed up the brook downstream raising the water table and flooding this little depression. If the beavers raise their dam just a couple of inches the pond will be connected to the brook and the fish might make quick work of the tadpoles.

Other notes: Wood frog eggs usually hatch between 10 and 30 days after deposition so we're still on schedule. The eggs are white below and black above. No algae has developed on the eggs yet (again probably because it's been so cold).

Wood Frog eggs

What: Wood frogs (Lithobates sylvaticus) have been singing in Centennial Woods for about a week now (sounds like a bunch of ducks quacking). Yesterday I was out and found several egg masses in various stages of development.

Ecological notes: Along with spring peepers, wood frogs are one of our first amphibians to emerge in the spring. Spending their time literally frozen for the winter, they revive with warming temperatures and head from their upland overwintering sites down to their breeding ponds. With the upcoming cold weather, this should slow down the development of the eggs considerably, and the tadpoles won't emerge for another 10 days or so.

Where: Wood frogs breed in shallow seeps, cattail marshes, and vernal ponds (particularly fond of the latter) and just about anywhere else there aren't fish to eat their tadpoles.

Other notes: There was a couple of inches of water on top of a thick sheet of ice at the bottom - must have frozen all the way through this winter. The little "pool" of water is at the bottom of a seep and slowly filters into Centennial Brook. The water on top is probably from increased flow of water as frozen ground water has been melting.