Their legs are tremendous

If you don't have a blog, you may not be aware that if you come to one through a Google search, the blogger can see the exact search you were doing if they use a statistics counter (which most do). It can be fun and revealing to see what people search. It can also be disturbing.

Take for example one that came up on my visitor records recently. Someone landed here after searching "How to get rid of polywogs." Well, they came to the wrong place!

Here we want as many polywogs as we can get. They don't stick around forever anyway. They sprout legs and hop away as frogs. So in answer to that question: Wait. With a little patience, you will soon automatically have less polywogs. That's how it works.

If you want to get rid of frogs, you'll have to figure that one out without me. A combination of using pesticides and the effects of global warming should help you along in your misguided cause. Frogs are becoming endangered, so your task shouldn't be too hard.

Here at the ranch we support and encourage our slimy-skinned friends, particularly natives. They're no imposition on us.

We are excited to report that a number of polywogs in our ponds (featured in previous posts) have sprouted legs. They are crawling out of the water and up onto the rocks and plants. When you lean down to look at them they spring into the air and land on twigs or blades of grass, their front legs clinging on, back legs dangling beneath them.

Can you find the frogs in this photo?


The one on the left with its legs stretched out is easier to see, but there is one more:


You can also see a few polywogs sprinkled about.

If you sit quietly and watch the pond, at first all you see are buzzing insects hovering and skimming on the surface of the water. Gradually dozens of tiny frogs forget you're watching and go back to what they were doing, becoming visible for the first time.