Pond Boss Forums INTRO Questions & Observations Vanishing tadpoles

Two days ago I had conservatively 50,000 tadpoles, up from about a consistent 5000 every day for the last 2 weeks. Today they are back to 5000 again. They were elbow to elbow, nose to tail along 3 banks of the pond.
These are the first tadpoles I have had in over 6 months. In the past I have had maybe 1 or 2 thousand and they disappear over a two week period. Nothing appears to be eating them. However, they disappeared during the night. Coincidently I pumped my pond down 8 inches so they didn't go over the spillway.
Any ideas?

Are they getting bigger? They could be eating each other.

Birds, snakes, turtles and other fish eat them, any chance thats whats happening?

It really sounds like an annual hatch and an annual mopping up or feeding frenzy. Do you hear a bunch of burps coming from the water? It seems like you would have noticed this. I think it could be the old story of every prey has a predator and vice versa. 50 thousand frogs hitting the world from each water hole would be overwhelming.

Or could they have matured, grown legs and went walkabout? I guess you would have noticed that also.

Any of your poachers having tadpole soup?

There was a slight exaggeration, just after the sun went down and the water surface water temp dropped I counted about 15,000. My new guess is that they go deep to avoid the heat and some get the bends and die. Although, based on my past experience the tadpole soup is also very likely. One chili pepper for each tad, a dash of fish sauce, I can almost hear my neighbors slurping now.