More of Frogs - 2nd March 2026

What a difference four days have made!.

I returned to the same favoured pool where I had watched a dozen or so frogs commencing their annual breeding cycle at the end of last month but this time the pool was alive with activity as from a lethargic dozen the number of frogs had risen to an energised fifty to sixty.

The weather too had improved markedly from a chilly. grey overcast day, the wind gusting down the valley to one of sunshine and a milder southwest wind signifying Spring had truly arrived.No doubt about it.

Walking down the valley to the pool a Blackcap sang from the surrounding trees, the pure notes of its song a brief exultant exclamation on the still air and a sulphur yellow Brimstone butterfly flickered an erratic course across the  heads of the early flowering Celandines, their simple flowers like fallen yellow stars lying in the damp fen by my feet. Spring, the sweet Spring!

Arriving at the pools it was a scene of immense and increased activity in the same pool I had stood over a few days ago. A myriad of frogs heads poked above the water, facing towards the sun, which illuminated their china white throats as they swelled to produce an immensely relaxing, gentle purring sound. To call it a croak would be a gross slur on the soothing pleasant sound the frogs combined chorusing produced. Truly a frog chorus.

I looked down to the edge of the pool by the boardwalk and noted that unlike my last visit great jellied mounds of frog spawn now lay at the shallow water's edge like grey submerged clouds  while a multitude of frogs clambered heedlessly over it in their nuptial ardour 

The majority of frogs were males, barging and jostling each other in blunt rivalry and it was hard to discern an obvious female but with close attention we found a pair in amplexus,  where the male frog clings tightly to the female, riding on her back and waiting for that time when she ejects her spawn and he fertilises it as it emerges.The difference in size was marked, the male grey and smaller with a white throat still swelling as he produced his gentle purring, the female larger, bulky even, swollen with spawn and contrastingly coloured chestnut brown.

They tumbled around in the water amongst the spawn and emerging reeds, the pair constantly harassed by other males seeking to usurp the incumbent male but all were destined to failure as her mate, chosen by the quality of his purring, clung tightly and resolutely to her.

We noted too the variety of colours in the individual frogs, the majority grey with white throats, but others more greeny yellow and with distinct barring on legs and arms while others very much in the minority were chestnut brown and larger. Could these last be females yet to accept a mate.

There are always questions and conumdrums.The more you observe the more you realise how little you  know.I realise I know so little about these secretive amphibians, rarely encountering them apart from these few days in early Spring.

We stood for almost an hour, fascinated by the evolving activity with frogs appearing and disappearing in the clear water, rising to face the sun and sinking to the bottom of the pond jostling and barging in sudden bursts of movement then to lie still and watchful.

It will all be over by the end of the week.