You're a lucky woman Marg! In your garden, they're probably toads. They eat lots of insects!! Did they come back again this year?

Tanja

I live on a farm and there's a drainage ditch across the middle of the property. We have some there all the time. The neighbors across the road have a large pond and we can here the toads/frogs every night. I also placed large rocks in my flowerbeds for them to hide under. The other night we had a huge one hopping across the patio while we were eating. DH went over and shooed it to a boulder where it would be cooler and more protected from the hot sun. Marg

Wishing I had toads and or frogs in my pond
Bought this house three years ago has a pond but I now do not use a pump to circulate the water. But do have lots of lily pond lily, and pickerel week with it's nice blue flower as well some day type lilies that bloom in the water in spring

It is a good sized back yard pond and seems to be doing well without the use of a pump to circulate the water.
Leaves and whatever settle to the bottom and there now is maybe three or four inches of dirt or mud in the bottom Maybe more than that
Goldfish have been there now two years and have become a decent size
Dragon flies etc. land on and around the water
I have some sticks around the pond for things to land on
Large and small rocks and gravel and places that frogs or toads could hide in or under to keep cool
Alas not a frog or toad to be seen
The past two years in the late summer one or two come around but in spring do not see them, again
Perhaps they die in the pond and I wonder where to they ever come from in the first place as we live in an older subdivision and about half a mile from the lake. But not really ponds and bushes etc. around.

I wondered about catching some to keep around but would be better done in spring.

Did put some tadpoles in this spring but of course the goldfish ate them all. Not a one escaped.

I would love to have a pond but I don't need anything that will attract pests, i.e. racoons,skunks. We also have a Great Blue Heron clan that flies overhead each day and stops to eat in the drainage ditch. They also stop in ponds because they seem to sense that an easy meal is there. Have you seen any flying overhead? If you have, maybe it stopped to eat your frogs? That's why some people string fishing line across a pond. They are cute tho. This one decided to come for a visit.
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Then he became a peeping tom/heron

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I saw it again last summer and it had gotten it full plumage. Marg

That was good of you to post your pictures Marg

I know I had a flock of birds one fall land on my smallish pond and got most of the fish.

Only happened one time though fortunately