Cattails and pond grass were taking over areas of the pond so I donned my waders to do a little weed pulling. As I approached the pond on the west side I noticed several little leopard frogs about the size of my thumb hopping out of my way. That indicated a new crop of frogs which could have only come from the frogs we collected as tadpoles from Wildcat Bluff last year. It seemed only about six of the tads progressed to the frog stage and of those only one survived the winter, or so I thought. We weren’t able to get anymore tadpoles out at the Bluff this year so I figured we were back to square one. I also thought it would take a couple of years for the frogs from last year to reach breeding maturity. Not so, apparently. Later I went to the east side of the pond and discovered little frogs everywhere, a biblical plague of frogs. Joyce and I are quite pleased. We should now have our sustaining population of leopard frogs for the first time in half a century. No self-respecting pond can be without frogs.
Meanwhile out at Wildcat Bluff Nature Center I arrived at the usual time Wednesday morning to do my bit but my way to the back parking lot was blocked by rattlesnake of the western diamondback variety. It was making its way across the parking lot and I had to wait a little bit for it to crawl out of the way so I could pull into the parking lot. When I first saw it, there was a half-grown cottontail close to it and I thought the rattler was homing in on it. Turns out it was the other way around. The rabbit seemed quite interested in the snake and stayed with it as it crawled along, close but not too close. After the two moved far enough out of my way I pulled into the parking lot. I guess that spooked the rattler because it turned around and slithered into the bushes from where it apparently came. Later I told Vivien the director about this and she said that was the one that stayed under the visitor center porch. The one I’d seen partially under the porch a couple of weeks ago was much darker. It happened to be visible at the edge of the porch and we walked out to look at it. Not only was it darker in color, it was a much heavier-bodied snake than the one crawling across the parking lot. A more lethal-looking reptile I never hope to see.
One other thing. While out at the Bluff I noticed the rats that take advantage of the bird seed spilled from the bird feeders didn’t scurry off when I walked up to the back of the visitor center. My first thought was that they are getting used to people but later it occurred to me maybe they would rather take their chances with me than run under the porch where scarier things than I might be waiting for them.