Very likely they are tiny young of the American Toad. I love their life cycle. We hear their thrilling songs for a few days, then out of all sides of the woods around us they come by the hundreds. The water is thrashing wildly in the shallows as the males and females chase each other. Then there is mating and egg laying, an enormously long string of eggs from each female. Just like that the singing stops and overnight all the adults are gone, back into the woods.
Then after a few days there are millions of black specs and then toad 'poles'. I've been watching ours for the past week, they are growing every day and becoming stronger swimmers all the time. In another week or 10 days they will all be hopping in the grass furiously trying to get back into the woods before they get picked off by birds.
We have been privileged to watch this exact scene play out at the same time after ice out for the last 6 springs in a row at our tiny little pond.
See this great web page with pictures of their lifecycle.
American Toad life with pictures
