Frogs!

March 14, 2010 by Ben
Filed under: Uncategorized

About a week ago, Nana and Papaw came for a visit and we walked along a new greenway trail together near the boys’ school. The temps were great and there were lots of other people out walking on the trail. And while we walked we could hear some frog sounds, and excitedly I said to Evan, “are those frogs?” “Yeah, Dad, and they’re NOT spring peepers, either. Those are wood frogs.”

During this week, we began to notice we could hear frogs at the window close to the boys’ bedtime. It sounded far away, like the frogs were down past the woods somewhere near the little creek we call “salamander creek.” I asked Evan, and when he listened he said he was sure what kind of frogs they were.

On Saturday, close to bedtime, I took the boys on an adventure. We got on our boots and jackets and I packed my digital recorder. I recorded our walk down to the creek, across the creek and up the hill and then through the briers to where we could hear the frogs the loudest. We stood there for about 8 minutes taking turns holding the microphone. Below is the recording of the frogs. We are trying to identify the species and are not sure about it yet. From other recordings we’ve listened to, it sounds the most like the Western Chorus Frog but we don’t believe they live around here.

We listed through these two CDs without finding a match:
The Frogs and Toads of North Carolina, Michael Dorcas
The Calls of Frogs and Toads, Lang Elliott

If you listen closely, just about exactly in the middle of the recording, you can hear a very excited Grayson enjoying the moment.

If you have ideas about what kind of frog this is, let us know!

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Comments

4 Responses to “Frogs!”

Ben on March 15th, 2010 8:09 am

I think this is it – Upland Chorus Frog (Pseudacris feriarum):
http://www.herpsofnc.org/herps_of_NC/anurans/Psefer/Pse_fer.html
London on March 15th, 2010 8:44 am

This is my all time favorite. The only voice I recognized was the rare and beautiful Grayson Frog though. Thanks for sharing – London
Aenea on March 15th, 2010 8:45 am

I wish we had woods and a creek for the kids to explore like I did when I was a kid. It was so much fun! Maybe one day!
Nancy Morgan on March 15th, 2010 9:03 am

Loved it!!! This has been so much fun listening in on your adventure– And now we know exactly how much Grayson likes frogs How awesome to be able to tell what kind they are without seeing them!