Frogspawn

[Tricia]

I was outside refilling the bird feeders yesterday during a brief pause in the rainfall when I noticed two large splodges of frogspawn in my pond.
I hope the fish don't eat it all. I remember that last year it disappeared rather quickly and I never got to see any tadpoles at all.

[alison]

I am so excited. Even though that is normal for me when the frogs come back. I end up not doing any work as I stand and watch them all returning. I put in a small pond last year if you remember, just a tiny thing to put frogspawn in so that at least some of the tadpoles would have a better chance of survival with no fish to eat them. This year they have returned and although so many have gone into the original pond I have at least a dozen or so of them in the tiny pond and they have already laid 4 or 5 clumps of spawn.
I have a worry though as this pond hasn't any pump or filter to give some running water. I don't really know what to do about it. Shall I just keep emptying a bit out and putting fresh in once a week or so whilst the spawn and taddies are in it? I remember reading a little while ago on here or on the gardenweb site that daphnia can keep a pond fresh. How much would I need though that is the question???? I did put a few of the little bagfulls that you can buy into the pond on saturday but i would think that you would need a lot more than that. Anyone have any ideas? Damp you are good on these kind of things what do you suggest.?
I have also had the returning red frog. She is really a good colour of red. I remember when I saw her last year I thought she had redleg disease but then realised that she was just that colour. I wonder if her babies are going to be red coloured.
I have a few of the frogs with the same thing as last year. They look like they have had lots of blisters on them. You know when you get a blister and the dying off skin leaves like a whiteish skin where the blister has been. This is what they look like when they are under the water. I haven't picked one out yet to see what they are like out of the water but they are just covered with these little areas. They don't seem to bother them. I wonder what they are really. I think I am on the way to over 30 frogs so far I will have a good count later.
excitement is mounting....

[dampflippers]

I haven't got any frogspawn yet this year, and I'm worrying that I won't. I have discovered that the rooks are watching and hopping down to catch frogs.
I can still hear croaking at night, but there seem to be less than there were a week or so ago, and I have only seen a couple of pairs in embrace.

How big is your small pond Alison? I generally redistribute my spawn among the 3 ponds and tubs in the garden. I wouldn't put more than about 1/4 or 1/8 of a clump or less in a tub or bucket. I only needed to change the water in the first year when I put in far too many.
Lots of plants should help. If you are worried, take out a bucketful of water and replace with water butt water occasionally.

I now mainly use daphnia for food for newts and baby newts, but I would put half a bag in each tub or bucket too. Depends on how much I want to spend......thinking about it, I'll go and put some in today!

[alison]

The small pond is small about a foot wide and maybe 5-6 ft long with half of that in shallows of about 6inches depth and the deep end probably just over a foot deep. (Just doing that from memory though so I could be way out. )There were between 12 and 15 frogs in it and there are lot of clumps of spawn. In the main pond we counted 48 frogs and there could have been some under the water that we didn't see. There is more spawn than ever before even in the middle of the pond. Now I heard the other day that if frogspawn is in the middle of the pond then we should have a lovely hot summer, but I reckon that it is only in the middle because that was where there was an area of plants. I have never seen so much over all the plants and it is laying over the whole of the shallow end on the bottom of the pond as well. It makes me wonder how much ponddipperdave has as he said he counted at least 77 frogs.
Getting back to the small pond I think I will put some oxygenating plants in and an Iris or two to give them some shelter.

[dampflippers]

I was going to say just put in lots of oxygenators.

[alison]

I think I posted somewhere that I had bought a little fountain pump but when we tried it out it sucked up some of the spawn so that was a disaster so now I have just put five small clumps of oxygenators in. The tadpoles have hatched which I think was faster than usual from the jelly maybe because it has been a little warmer than usual for this time of year. Today it is back to winter or at least feels that way and I have put the heating back on in the early mornings just to warm up the house.
The small pond is totally green now but I didn't want to do a water change because I might have thrown out some of the taddies. It doesn't smell stagnant and I know that the taddies will eat the algae so I am not worried about that yet. In the big pond the tadds have nearly all hatched and are quite big. It is lovely to see so many, but soon the fish will realise they are there and ready to be munched on. I am hoping most will survive.
The pond itself is beginning to look alive again. The plants are all doing well. The marsh marigold is so beautiful as it is fully covered with lovely yellow flowers. The larger japanese monster marsh marigold is not flowering yet but is getting bigger everyday. Some little stems of reeds are showing themselves and the Iris are looking lovely.They are about halfway to their normal height already. The whole garden is beginning to come alive with daffs and hyacinths tulips and polyanthus. I love spring.