The Amphibian Foundation's Frog Blog

An amazing photo of a female Wood Frog by my new friend, Lisa Powers. Females are generally reddish in color, particularly during their breeding season. One of the first signs of spring — or at least the ones I look for — are the Wood Frogs. Where I am from in Massachusetts, Wood Frogs brave the ice and snow to make it to their vernal ponds to breed every year. I can recall many times when I am out at night in the spring—freezing! ... and these little frogs aren't complaining (and they can't even produce their own body heat!) — they are just making their way to the breeding site. In Georgia, the Wood Frogs are out right now, calling and laying eggs in ephemeral pools (and occasionally the edges of permanent wetlands) Wood Frogs typically lay all their eggs in one place, so if you find one clutch, you have probably found them all. When laid, they are about the size and shape of a tennis ball or baseball, but quickly swell up with water and become much larger. Here is a ...

'What do frogs do in the winter?' "Was visiting yesterday and strolled past both the "Frog Baby" pond and  the lily pond.  Where do the frogs go in the winter?  Thank you."  -  Christine C. Thank you for your question! The answer to which I find particularly fascinating. Frogs do several different things to handle freezing temperatures in the winter. Those bullfrogs in the Garden ponds ... do just what they and other frogs do in the winter which is brumate . Brumation is like hibernation, only metabolically it is a much different process utilized by cold blooded animals. Leopard frogs and Green frogs are other examples of frogs that brumate. They simply burrow, dig or hide deep enough below the frost line where they won't actually be exposed to freezing (or below) temperatures. Other frogs (at least up and down the East Coast) actually posses the biological equivalent of antifreeze in their cells so freezing temperatures ar...