It’s that time of year again when frogs converge on ponds all over the country to mate and spawn. Depending on where you are, and even depending on local conditions and weather, you may or may not already have frogs in residence. I read a newspaper report that in the autumn somewhere in Devon frogs were spawning, which is right out of kilter with the natural timing of things. Freak behaviour, an unseasonally warm autumn? We don’t really know, but of course it attracted the ‘global warming’ angle. Unfortunately it was probably bad news for the frogs in the end. Our pond is about 6 foot by 4 foot, a proprietary moulded affair from a garden centre. A couple of years ago there were 32 adult frogs in it during the breeding season – last year there were only 4. I am hoping that it is just a natural cycle ‘thing’, but there is a disease that has affected frogs recently, and I found a few dead ones showing signs of it. When the breeding population was at its height the croaking noise at night was remarkable. One evening our neighbour arrived home late and thought we had left the lawn mower running in the garden, they really are that loud. Not bad for a suburban garden. If we get a decent frog year I think we’ll have to plunge the GoPro in and have a more intimate look. As a wildlife cameraman I do tend to avoid bus man’s holidays, but when you can sit in the garden, have a cuppa and film at the same time, why not?
