Frogs anyone??

During the first two weeks of May, every night from dusk to the time we fell asleep, we were serenaded by a frog out in our back yard. With the windows open, this frog's song drifted up into our windows quite loudly. This happened every night...just like clockwork. After a few days, it began to get unnerving especially as it dawned on me that the frog sounded like it was in the pool. With the winter cover still on the pool, I was concerned it would get underneath and die. I would go outside and try to see it, but never could because the pool cover is black.

Then we left for our 12-day vacation with no frogs to keep us awake at night.

The day after we returned from vacation, we began working on opening the pool. It didn't take long to realize that our singing frog must have actually been two singing frogs as our pool cover had atleast 200 tadpoles swimming around on top of it. (Elaine, of course, wanted to "save" them so we let her scoop out 20 or so and they are now swimming around in an aquarium on the deck.) So the frog story is completed. Right?

No. A few days ago, as Mark called us out to see an unusual looking gray frog that was perched on the underside of the grill cover which is also gray. Elaine scooped it up to examine it while Elisabeth and I came into the computer to look it up. We discovered that it was a gray tree frog and that it was also, more than likely, the mother of all of our tadpoles. We had Elaine take it to the woods in hopes that it would find a new place to call home.

But, last night as dusk set in, we began hearing our frog singing again. We all stopped and looked at one another as the singing was clearly coming from the pool deck. We went outside with the flashlight and found two frogs and one toad IN our pool. It was almost as if they were waiting for us to clean up and go inside so they could start their own party. Elaine and I scooped them up and carried them to the ditch out front near the road--again hoping they would find a new home.

However, it wasn't an hour later, and we heard two distinct frogs singing to one another just outside our back windows. Will this frog saga ever end?

Now honestly, I'm not opposed to sharing our pool with a few frogs. I rather like the sound of their singing--tree frogs don't croak like bullfrogs do, they actually make a higher-pitched trilling sound that is kind of fun to listen to. As long as the frogs swim at night and let us swim during the day, I'm okay with this. However, I do have a huge problem with two things: 1) finding dead, bloated frogs in the pool skimmer and 2) having hundreds of tadpoles hatching in my pool as a result of the frog parties.

So, since I don't believe the frogs can party responsibly in my pool, I am on a mission to relocate them. But that brings me to the next generation...the 20 tadpoles living on my back deck.......