Of Fish and Frogs and Polywogs...

No pond is complete without some sort of critters swimming or hopping or flying around. This year I have goldfish, shubunkins, 1 oranda, some small frogs and one VERY fat bullfrog named Fred. Of all the frogs that appeared this spring, only one had the courage to stay around long enough for me to feed him. It only took a few night crawlers and Fred was hooked. I started feeding him yard worms, but it was such a dry summer that the worm supply literally dried up. Now, I make bimonthly trips to the bait store to purchase Fred's daily dole of night crawlers. When I go out to the pond in the morning Fred is waiting. If I spend too much time feeding the fish he often jumps on them and kicks them away. He has become tame enough to take the worms from my fingers. Sometimes he mistakes my fingers for the worms and chomps on them instead. This tends to startle both of us, but really isn't an unpleasant experience for me, anyway.

I have had any number of inexpensive fish in my pond. I started out with some 9 cent goldfish and still have their decendants. I had koi at one point, (above) but after losing them during a very harsh winter, I decided to stick with goldfish and their kin. It's less wear and tear on my lilies. My fish are all in the bigger pond, while the smaller one is home to some small frogs. I don't seem to have any baby fish this year and the small frogs seem to be disappearing. I think Fred may have something to do with this.

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