Circle of Life, Disrupted

A few weeks ago our driveway, along with our entire state, flooded. The entire driveway was one large ankle deep puddle. The weekend after the flood, the sun came out and the weather teased us with a taste of early summer. Our waterlogged lawn kept on flowing water off to the side, and the driveway dried out a bit except for a large network of puddles on the far side.

That summery weekend frogs took up residence in the puddle and proceeded to throw a froggy orgy. Frogs left their little keys in the bowl and proceeded to pair up all over the driveway. It was to the point where we couldn’t drive in without having to get up and interrupt the action so we could move them all to the side. I joked about blasting some Barry White out the living room window. But it didn’t look like we didn’t need to do that. They were getting on just fine without our help.

Last weekend I was near the puddles getting some firewood. I looked down and saw millions of squirming black tadpoles. Millions of them. I ran into the house to get Todd, and we excitedly watched them all squirm. We speculated as to how many frogs we’d have hopping all over the place.

Todd went inside and researched on the web about raising tadpoles into frogs. We learned that we cannot fill the puddles with the hose, because the copper from the pipes in the house would kill them. The puddles were still several inches deep, so we didn’t think it would be a problem.

On Monday the sun came out, and the temperature rose to the high 60’s-low 70’s. When we got home from work, the puddle was a bit smaller. Then on Tuesday we had another nice day. When we returned home the puddle had disappeared. Left in its place were oily looking black splotches. We looked closer and saw that the millions of little tadpoles had died when their home dried out.

And I wonder how long it’ll take for Nemo to roll in it.