Over-run by frogspawn!

[zukitia]

We recently moved house and in the back garden have a pond is about 1m square by about 6 ins deep. On Monday I noticed 2 frogs and 1 lot of frogspawn -Hooray! But by this morning I now have 10 frogs and 7 mounds of frogspawn!

As my pond is only little I am worried that there will not be enough room for all the frogs and tadpoles - and also a bit worried that I will be over-run by froglets! Obviously I don't want to hurt them and will happily leave them be if its best but given the space issue should I try and move them to the beck, about 300 yards away?

[WendyS]

zukita - I have this problem every year with my mini pond and have never really resolved it ( have 15 batches of frogspawn this year!). I usually give some to local neighbours with ponds (although they often have the same problem). I've also taken buckets of it and put it in local streams or put some on the compost heap as soon as it hatched. In reality, although hundred of tadpoles hatch, many die naturally or get eaten when small by fish or newts. I supplement their food (they eat green algae from the side of the pond) with boiled lettuce. Boil it for 5 minutes until it's soft. When the tadpoles have sucked all the green fibres away remove the white stems from the pond. (The old fashioned butterhead or Little Gem varieties are best). As your pond is so small, I'd be tempted to keep a maximum of two batches of frogspawn otherwise you'll be overrun. When the froglets leave the pond end June/July, take great care before mowing your lawn. They're only the size of your fingernail and you can easily churn them up with your mower blades, if the magpies don't come down and pick them off first. It's a risky (and short) life being a baby froglet so have lots of low ground cover in your borders for them to shelter under. Enjoy watching them grow anyway!

[zukitia]

Hi WendyS - If I take some of the frogspawn to the local beck, what about the mummy and daddy frogs? Do they need to stay with their own spawn? I don't want to split up happy families!!

[morg_monster]

Ahh bless!!! mum and dad frog don't play a part in the tadpoles lives after the frogspawn has been 'laid' and fertilised. They are probably glad to get away from their thousands of potential children...!!

[Thunderbird+]

The way I see it Zukitia is, the reason they lay so many eggs is that they know there is a whole bunch of preditors out there waiting to make a meal of them and only a small percentage will survive.

[willowman]

If you leave the spawn to grow into frogs, then any that survive will return year after year to the same place that they were hatched. Soon you will be over-run with them! Get rid of it as soon as you can. Last year we had about 20 couples playing piggy-back in our pond. Don't know where they go for the rest of the year, but some have already come back and spawned. Out with the bucket again.

[raysparx]

Dirty Frog,naughty Frog, get back on your lily pad!!!

[WendyS]

zukita - was just researching the internet for another question I had about frogspawn when I read on one site that if there are too many tadpoles in a pond, they can be fed very tiny amounts of catfood. (It didn't say whether it should be a fish or meat variety but I would imagine meat variety would be better). So it you don't resolve your surplus frogspawn problem, you might try this. (I will also give it a try, although too much would contaiminate the water).