We just had our second and third round of toad eggs this weekend. Right now the first batch has started growing their back legs and fortunately/unfortunately they have been eating all the newer layed eggs. We have so many of them it is not a bad thing. They are fun to watch and the kids love them.

I noticed a second batch of toad eggs too. The first batch disappeared one day (all of them). They were swimming around eating algae and then all gone. Never saw a single baby toad.

The bad thing is that I pulled out what looked to be a decomposed lily leaf.. I am thinking now that it might have been another mass of eggs.... Ugg! the joys and pitfalls of being a newbie.

If you want an interesting experience, collect a batch of the eggs (with water) in a nice clear tupperware container and set them on your desk. You will be able to see the whole life cycle. Very little problem, just add a little pond water once in a while and make sure they have something to crawl out on when they get their legs (otherwise they will drown).

I want frogs .... I've got a bazillion gazillion toadpoles, have gone through I don't know how many batches of toad eggs (lost count) & heard them trilling again last night. Cute little tiny toads jumping around though & the toadpoles are eating on the algae (a good thing).

The word toad makes you think of something ugly ..... frogs are cute.

I am done with the worring about whether or not the pond is balancing right.. something has to be right.. I have the frog eggs and now my fish are spawning.. ah.. it is good to be me today!

Shiollie... I haven't been here in a long time, but am getting re-involved. I'm in MI too and we've had some weird things. Like tons of large toads and not a single male toad calling out for mates this spring (first time that's ever happened), and our fish are doing their majort spawning now (a month late). This is the best and most established our pond has ever been, and with the warm weather I expected this in late April... not mid-June (and still no toad calls).

Can you take a picture of your pond and the frog eggs? I'd like to see what you have so maybe we can replicate something close to it to get our Green Frogs to reproduce in our pond. Thanks! And if you need hosting, I have my own website and I can host high-bandwidth pics for you. Just tell me if it's needed.

-Jeff

Jeff, I would post pics of the frog eggs but the fish ate them, and they keep eating all their eggs too.. dang it!
I have tons of toads in the yard but have only seen a small one by the pond so far.
Where in MI are you, I am in between GR an Kzoo.

That's great! You know what my kids got me for mothers day? Five fat bullfrog tadpoles that they found in the creek! I've got them in my 55g aquarium and I'll move them out to the pond when their legs start growin in. I've read bullfrog poles can live up to 2 years before maturing into frogs, so I could well have them a long time. And they are fascinating to watch!

Shiollie - I live in Grand Rapids (NE side). I am going to make a second water garden a bog garden just for frogs because of this issue. Losing 400+ mature Tree frog tadpoles was sad this week.

I am bringing this back up because I have a question, I found 8 eggs that the fish could not see, so in order to save them I got a very clean mason jar and put some pond water in it and carefully snipped off the section of the plant that has the eggs on it and put them in the jar. I put the jar into a mini green house (only place the cats cant get to) it gets sun but does not get overly hot.. so do I need to provide aration (sp) to the water or can I just let them alone? ( they are getting bigger everyday and I can just make out tiny tails)

I would leave them alone

Shiollie. Just put fresh pond water in there (gently) when needed. The tadpoles will need to absorb oxygen through their skin, so if the water lost all it's O2, they'd die. But aerating it with a pump would disturb them too much ina small area.

I've got to say I am so happy for you that you have the chance to help them grow up. Frogs and toads are such wonderful creatures... I can't wait until the day we have a self-sustaining population, and lots of active croaking/singing frogs.

Thanks, for the replies. I have always been a nature nut so this is great for me.

Jeff, you should come to my house in August, (15 min. away from you) we have sooo many tree frogs singing, it is very loud but I sleep the best cuz of the "seranade".