Frogs! I LOVE frogs!
We used to go and gather frog spawn when I was little - and raise the tadpoles - and then release them as they were almost frogs.
They are the most glorious creatures.
It was so great seeing the wee tadpoles moving around in the egg membrane just before they hatched - and fantastic watching the little leg buds grow, and the tadpoley faces change into froggy faces.
So sad that frogs have died off in such huge numbers...
That sounds like fun, dlowan! I've observed, but I've never incubated froglings.
Today and last weekend, our hiking took us around lakes and ponds. At points both weekends, we had several frogs leaping at each step. I was franticly looking at my foot placement so as not to step on any. Today we also saw some field toadies. I remembered mowing the lawn as a kid and stopping to move the buggers so I could continue.
I did the whole thing - the caterpillars turning to butterflies and moths - every year my room was filled with fat caterpillars munching on their proper leaves - tadpoles - baby birds what fell from the nest - praying mantis egg sacs - whatever was around.
haven't seen too many praying mantis around in my parts the last few years, then this year i find two in one week
about twenty years ago i was driving to a friends cottage in the late spring, and the road passed between many marshy areas, it was very late and very foggy and at one point i realised that something was not quite right, i stopped the car and got out to discover that the road was covered in frogs moving from one marsh to another, we had unfortunately driven over quite a few, having only about 25 feet to go to be out of the mass of amphibians, i said a few apologies to the squished and those about to be squished and got out of there as quickly as possible
When i was a child, i saw the most amusing thing with an insect--it was a walking stick. For those who are not from North America, we have an insect whose survival adaptation is that its body looks like a small twig, and it has the chameleon-like ability to take on the color of its background. There was an old 1940's style travel trailer out the woods at a lake we used to visit, and it was a faded shade of that yukky pink which was once, for reasons unknown, very popular. The poor insect had perfectly mimiced the pink shade of the painted side of the trailer, but as heavy clouds raced by overhead and obscured the sun, and cast shadow on the trailer, the insect would briefly turn a sickly pale reddish brown before reverting to a nearly exact shade of pink to match the paint. I was flabbergasted. It occurs to me now that this must have wreaked havoc on the critter's internal chemistry.
I rented a house with a woman who had captured a praying mantis and a black widow and put them in a cage together to see who would win (she was banking on the praying mantis). I thought it wicked and didn't pay attention enough to ever found out who won.
The frog/toad thing is tricky. The field we walked through today was rife with peepers. I took to the rutts of the dirt drive so I could scan for them. I've never had to be in a spot where a mass animal crossing was happening, dunno what I'd do. I guess I'd grit my teeth and goo on through.
Set, them walking sticks live elswhere too. In some tropics they get much much biiger than they are here. Has anyone seen a walking stick in the last 15 years?
We call them stick insects, and yes, I have.
But it was in captivity.
We have them up north.
I used to have a wondrous variety of mantids in my garden - it was such a joy to find them, cos having lots of predatorts like that tells you the garden is healthy.
That and the gazillions of worms I had!
I also adore meece and rats and such....
In a thread i started (and which ended, very quickly, in disaster) many moons ago, entitled HORROR, i described how as a liddly i was chasing a rabbit and was chastised by my grandfather, him saying i could cause it to die from a heart attack. Several years later, while working in a farm field, i captured a ground squirrel and brought it home. I took it out of the box in which i had put it, and it began to frantically gnaw on my thumb. It did me no harm, but i suddenly recalled the incident with the rabbit so many years before, and became much disheartened to think of the needless terror i had provoked in the breast of the unoffending creature. I released it and it disappeared in the direction of the nearest wood lot. I was then overcome with even more remorse to think that i had torn it from its familiar surroundings, which it likely would never see again.
Thereafter, i was and to this day remain, very conscious of how we can blunder and lurch into the lives of small creatures and inflict so much needless torment. I must admit to a mammalian bigotry, i am less concerned with amphibians, fish and insects.
Yep - I know exactly what you mean.
To a Mouse, on Turning Her Up in Her Nest, With The Plough
Wee, sleekit, cowrin', tim'rous beastie,
O, what a panic's in thy breastie!
Thou need na start awa sae hasty,
Wi' bickering brattle!
I wad be laith to rin an' chase thee,
Wi' murd'ring pattle!
I'm truly sorry man's dominion,
Has broken Nature's social union,
An' justifies that ill opinion,
Which makes thee startle
At me, thy poor, earth-born companion,
An' fellow-mortal!
I doubt na, whiles, but thou may thieve;
What then? poor beastie, thou maun live!
A daimen icker in a thrave
'S a sma' request;
I'll get blessin wi' the lave,
An' never miss't!
Thy wee bit housie, too, in ruin!
It's silly wa's the win's are strewin!
An' naething, now, to big a new ane,
O' foggage green!
An' bleak December's winds ensuin,
Baith snell an' keen!
Thou saw the fields laid bare an' waste,
An' weary winter comin fast,
An' cozie here, beneath the blast,
Thou thought to dwell ---
Till crash ! the cruel coulter past
Out thro' thy cell.
That wee bit heap o' leaves an' stibble,
Has cost thee monie a weary nibble!
Now thou's turn'd out, for a' thy trouble,
But house or hald,
To thole the winter's sleety dribble,
An' cranreuch cauld !
But Mousie, thou art no thy lane,
In proving foresight may be vain;
The best-laid schemes o' mice an' men
Gang aft agley,
An' lea'e us nought but grief an' pain,
For promis'd joy !
Still thou art blest, compar'd wi' me!
The present only toucheth thee:
But och! I backward cast my e'e,
On prospects drear!
An' forward, tho' I canna see,
I guess an' fear!
-- Robert Burns
very good citation, Miss Wabbit, thankee kindly . . .
The times I have stupidly and needlessly stressed a wild animal haunt me.
The times I have stupidly and needlessly stressed a wild animal haunt me.
Damn! I hate this place today!
Double posts galore.
Might be your dial-up connection, if you use one. Things seem to run smoothly from where i sit.
It's been sticky for me tonight too. Not always, but often.
husker wrote:LadyJ yer cracking me up!!!
now are you wearing undies under that dress??
Undies? When one can go commando?
I love this thread! And all my tomboy counterparts and admirers of said tomboys.
Set, your story was beautiful, Mary and Bonny. Thank you very much for that.
I was wondering about pioneer times in America after reading that. Surely there must have been a good many tomboys to survive the trials of that era.
You know, soz is right. We all have our own adolecent angst and there are harder things to overcome than tomboyism. Thank you for putting things into perspective soz.
I have been thinking a bit about this - tomboys and maybe what could be called tomgirls. I'm thinking (don't laugh) that it may really come down to, as adults, is footwear; most particularly sandals.
Let's test my theory by talking about our sandals and our relationship with sandals.
You go first....
