Lily pad-covered pond is a day spa for frogs

Walk over to the pond in Sue Bow-ser's North End yard and at first all you see is an idyllic little pool almost covered in green lily pads and an occasional lily pad bud stalk.

Then you look again and see frogs lounging on the lily pads. Then you look some more and see even more frogs taking it easy among the floating leaves. And then you discern a frog or two sitting motionless and fading into the rocks around the pond's edge.

Because of their greenish-brown coloring, the critters blend in with their background so well that you find another frog every time you think you've seen all there is to see.

It's as if Bowser's pond is a day spa for frogs. Some laze, legs stretched out on top of a lily pad. Others rest with their heads pillowed on a pad.

Bowser doesn't know what kind frogs she has.

"I've always liked frogs," she said. "They are as cute as they can be, but I've never studied them."

I don't know much about frogs either, but with "Amphibians and Reptiles of the Carolinas and Virginia" tucked under my arm and consultation with insect ace Robert Brown, who also knows a lot about frogs, I've decided Bow-ser has at least two species - southern leopard frogs and green frogs. There are no bullfrogs that I can see, much to my surprise.

Southern leopard frogs live up to their name because they have spots down their green backs, though they can be brownish in color, too. A great website, eNature.com, notes that a leopard frog has a clever way of escaping a predator. It dives and then makes a sharp right turn and surfaces at the far edge of a pond while the predator follows the frog's original path.

Green frogs are for the most part brown with a neat green moustache, bulging eyes and large external ears on either side of the head. Green frogs especially enjoy sitting by the edge of the water waiting for an insect to fly by, and that's what I saw when I first arrived in Bowser's yard.

Bowser has had the pond for about 11 years and she said she has had frogs off and on all along, but this year, she has more than ever.

"There's been a surge in the population this year - definitely," she said. "I've never seen this many."

The bumper crop of frogs began in April when frogs were croaking and singing their heads off. Both frogs have distinctively different calls that you can hear at eNature.com. Then the noise stopped.

"I didn't see any in May and June," Bowser said. "And all of a sudden they are back."

She said now whenever she goes out in the back yard, she can hear them, going "plop, plop, plop" back in the water.

"I'm so glad they feel comfortable here," she said.

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Birdzilla  That’s what Marina Phillips in Chelsea calls a hummingbird that “sits all day in a dogwood tree right above our hummingbird feeder and dive bombs any unfortunate hummer who stops by for a sip of nectar. The bird (a female) is there when we get up in the a.m. and is still there as the sun is setting.”

Discriminating renter  Joan and Terrie Alexander spotted a “hermit crab that had taken up residence in a beautiful turquoise ceramic shell” near the canal behind their Sandbridge yard. The shell, about 1 inch in diameter, tapered to a point and was about 3 inches long.

Good nature links on my blog 

• Karen Beatty sent a great link on how fast a hawk flies.
• John Winsor captured video of hummingbirds fighting over his feeder and called it “Hummingbird War.”
• Get a link to a video of the Virginia Aquarium’s newest critters, deep water isopods.
• Binoculars 101  Wild Birds Unlimited is offering free primers on birding binoculars at 9 a.m. Saturday  at the Greenbrier Parkway store in Chesapeake, 436-4472, and at 11 a.m. also on Saturday  at the Hilltop store in Virginia Beach, 422-3215.

Eagle photos  Shelly Fowler published a full-color booklet of her photographs of the Norfolk Botanical Garden eagles, called, “Following the Eagles.” She sells the booklets for $28, $10 of which goes to support the garden eagle with a malformed beak that is living at the Wildlife Center of Virginia. Contact her at shellyva@cox.net. You can see her photos at her website: www.pbase.com/shellyva.

Photo ops  Liz Heischober and family came across a Portuguese man-of-war on the False Cape State Park beach. Heischober’s daughter, Allison, got a photo. See it and learn more about this giant jellyfish on my blog: hamptonroads.com/maryreidbarrow. 

• Emilie Serratelli in the North End sent photos of a polyphemus moth with its camouflaging eyespots.
• Cindi Fitzgerald at the south end of the beach sent photos of black swallowtail caterpillars devouring her parsley, so much of it that she had to purchase more at the grocery store. Fitzgerald also photographed a Luna moth caterpillar – all green with tiny red spots down either side – as did Dianne McClernon in Little Neck.
• Susan Wenzel snapped a bright green katydid on her door. Wenzel thinks the  2-inch long critter is an angular-winged katydid.
• Jane Brumley sent a photo of a sphinx moth feeding on her ginger lilies one evening down on Knotts Island.
• O.B. Corning photographed a pretty little five-lined skink that had gotten into his home in Windsor Oaks West.
• Michelle Gaggiotti in Newcastle sent a photo of an unusual sight, a juvenile blue grosbeak at her feeder. Though we are within their nesting range, we don’t see many blue grosbeaks here, except during migration.
• Sharon Fadness sent cute photos of a young blue jay that takes peanuts from her hand in her Great Bridge Gardens yard in Chesapeake.
• David Ballinger snapped a young Coopers Hawk bathing in the birdbath in his Windsor Oaks yard.