Spotted Salamander, Ambystoma maculatum. Female, in the field. A metro Atlanta species.

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Ask the frog staff: How many tadpoles actually survive into adulthood?

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Hi Mark. A frog friend and I were at the lily pond today and it was rife with tadpoles of various sizes and stages. Two questions: 1) It looked like the two ducks might be feeding on them ... do they? 2) How many tadpoles actually survive to frog adulthood? — Christine C. This particular topic has come up a lot recently, and one of our visitors beautifully photographed a heron eating a rather large bullfrog out of the lily pond in the Children's Garden . It was a graphic interaction, but demonstrates how vital amphibians are in food webs and one of the reasons we use to illustrate how important it is to keep amphibians around. Almost everything eats them, or their tadpoles, or their eggs ... or all three.  Many animals eat frogs exclusively (including some frog species!), and the herons at the Garden obviously love them. I have seen ducks eating tadpoles quite rapidly. In fact, my amphibian class last summer quantified how quickly different aquatic birds could ...
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