Pond Boss Forums GENERAL QUESTIONS Wildlife Management It Is Going To Be Noisy Around Here Soon

It is going to be noisy around here in a few months.

Amazing what you can see when you have clear water.

T what’s the noise from?

Pat zoom in and you can see all those divots are filled with Tadpoles.... soon-to-be little frogs.

They will be serenading the night when they are grown.

What organism originally made the divots?

They look a little small for BG, but I am not sure of the scale.

Aha amazing what zoom can do

My pond has been full of bull frog tads several times in the last 5 years and I am amazed that I'm not sweeping young frogs off my house porch 200 feet away. I'm not sure where they go...one day I have thousands of tads, then they start growing legs and sitting on the pond's vegetation with a stub of a tail, then there mostly gone. By all rights, it would seem that I would have frogs EVERYWHERE, but no. Don't get me wrong, I still have a healthy population of frogs, but not thousands or even hundreds. I see exodus' of toads and some leopard frogs leaving the pond heading for dry grounds, but the young bull frogs must be getting eaten right out of the pond of abducted by aliens.

I was at the pond a few days ago and saw a bass make repeated runs in the vicinity of these tadpoles. This was in 2'-3" of water. I just assumed he had some bait fish cornered as I didn't think bass liked tadpoles.

I assume the tadpoles did. The divots are size appropriate for them.

They'll eat them.

Around 6pm yesterday I was driving along the dam I looked down and saw 5 bass in shallow water 8" from the water's edge, facing the bank just laying in wait. On the side of the pond nearest the house the bass were in such shallow water their dorsal fins were above water...just laying there. Occasionally there was a big splash and I assume they caught something. There are lots of tadpoles. Being able to see fish in the water is all new to me as I am not accustomed to the clear water this drought has caused.

A bull frog will eat anything that moves, including frogs. I had some try to eat a 6 inch channel cat when daughter dragged it out of pond. So as some get bigger I think they eat the smaller ones. But they do leave their pond on rainy nights.

Clear water may be leading to lower BG fry survival. This may be why your are seeing more activity at the feeder(s) and the activity of shallow ambush on the BF tadpoles.

I don't recall if you stock TP. Would be interested in knowing if you stocked this year.

Yes, TP stocked at the beginning of May. Seeing lots of them at the feeder.

Something was busy on the nesting beds this spring. TP, CNBG, LMB, BCP ???