Lubbock Local Wildlife: Tadpole Update and DUH!!!

This week, the tadpole went from two legs...

...to four legs.

 

The transformation been much slower with this little guy than with the previous tadpoles, but the front legs did appear in a single day.

This is Peggy, the three-footed leopard frog.

 

Peggy came from Mr. Aquarium where she started as a tadpole. She transformed into a frog there, jumped into a koi tank, and lost a foot. She's not a great jumper, but she gets around just fine and loves a good cricket or ten.

 

All along, I have thought that the tadpoles from Clapp Park were a local variation of a leopard frog, but (I know you are stunned to hear this) I was wrong.

This is Ribbert.

 

You may recognize him from earlier posts. (Or not.) He loves a good cricket or twenty - quite the appetite. He is also very skittish. I have been using his image to try to identify which type of leopard frog he is, but I could not find him anywhere until I broadened my search. It turns out that he is a local variation of bullfrog. This explains why the tadpoles have taken so long to transform - bullfrog tadpoles generally take two years to metamorph into their adult state.

This is Kylie.

 

You may recognize her from an earlier post as well. (Or not.) She could care less about frogs, tadpoles, and lots of other things. She loves a good teaspoon of peanut butter or twenty and she loves relaxing on the couch.

 

May you find the answer to your mysteries and get over it when you are wrong. Better yet, may you be like Kylie and not be bothered by such trivia.

Lubbock Local Wildlife: An Eternal Tadpole Update

A little over two years ago I caught some tadpoles in Clapp Park. I thought it would be cool to keep them for a few weeks and watch them transform. Well, they had other plans. So here it is two years later and there are still five tadpoles who refuse to be frogs. They were apparently wise to choose to leap into my net way back then. Within a few months pond dried completely as part of our epic drought. (This year we have received epic rainfall and the pond is once again full.)

 

Yesterday I was cleaning the tank and noticed something shocking. Another of the tadpoles has decided to make the leap (You know darn well the pun is intended!) to frogdom! I apologize for the terrible photos, but I knew you'd still want to see them..

 

Look closely - the back legs just appeared.

 

And just in case you wanted to see one of the others - look Ma, no legs!

 

I am a little heartbroken, though. I am leaving town for a few days and will not be around for most of the transformation. I will come home to find that a big tadpole has become a small frog with a very tiny tail. They  grow up so fast!

 

In case you want to get caught up on the Clapp Park Tadpole saga, here are the links to the older posts.

 

5/14/2014 Tadpoles (and I stand in the middle of a playa lake)

 

8/5/2014 Playa and Tadpole Update - now with legs!

 

8/21/2014 The Jumbo Tadpoles Update

 

4/10/15

Lubbock Local Wildlife: Earth Day, Drought, Clapp Park

May nature enthrall you and may we all work together to protect this planet with which we have been blessed.

Thank you for taking the time to follow this blog!

Lubbock Local Wildlife: the Jumbo Tadpoles update

Things be happening!

8-21-14 This is Bob.

8-21-14 This is Ribbert.

8-9-14 This is Tanya's hand and a random tadpole. Bob and Ribbert looked like this on 8-9.

May August be a transformational month for you too!

Local Wildlife: Playa and Tadpole Update - now with legs!

Four legs!

Do you remember that guy in junior high, you know, the one with muscles and a mustache before anyone else? Well, over the last few weeks, he rose among the ranks of the tadpoles. While no one else is showing even a bump for rear legs, he sprouted back legs, then front legs, and he is getting frog eyes now. Snagit, it's cool to watch him change daily.

No legs.

!@#$% drought!

Very recently, we had rain in Lubbock - lots of it. It rained for days. The plants turned green. The playa lakes all filled up. I rejoiced in knowing that the frogs (if they ever became frogs) would have a home to return to. The playa lake (see blog link below) was full and overflowing. But, that was the end of May.

May 27

I rode over there yesterday to look around. The lake is back to a marshy series of puddles. It's an amazing place now for birders. I saw more than twenty snowy egrets and an equal number of green herons. Two mallard hens had ducklings paddling around. They are all there plucking all the aquatics life from the drying puddles. The birds are fat and happy.

Without rain, though, the playa will once again be dry in a few weeks.

August 4

In the deepest part of the playa, there is one holdout area with water. I sat for a while admiring the birds. Then I started seeing movement in the water. Lots of movement. One swirl had to be a fairly large carp. But there was a lot of little movement too. Small black catfish, some dark goldfish looking fish -  maybe small carp, and I think I saw little black toad tadpoles. The biodiversity is pretty amazing right now.

May the wonder of our local wildlife, even in a stinky city park, overwhelm you!

Here is a link to the last tadpole post. Tadpoles in Clapp Park

Local Wildlife: Tadpoles (and I stand in the middle of a Playa Lake)

Less than a year ago I rode the bike over to Clapp Park to sit by the water for a little while. I feel better near water. I feel better near water that is teeming with life. On this trip, I happened to scare up a leopard frog, a creature I had never seen in Lubbock before. It was a pleasant shock for me.

It seemed an excellent place to sit for a bit. As I sat there, I noticed a lot of activity in the murky water. Tadpoles. Hundreds of tadpoles!

So, I rushed home, set up an aquarium on the back porch, and rushed back to the park to catch a few. Which proved a little frustrating at first. The tadpoles, creatures not known for their intelligence or their swimming ability, proved to be too smart and too fast for me. But I devised an ingenious plan - to drag my net through the mud - and I caught about a dozen of them.

My overall plan was simple: bring them home, care for them, watch them change into frogs, and take them back to the playa lake. But I have run into two challenges.

Challenge 1: The tadpoles are uncooperative. They seem to have no desire to be frogs. There is not a single sign of frogginess in any of them. Not even a bump where a leg should appear. They are all healthy. They love meal time. They get along well with the other fish I have introduced them to, but there is no inkling of metamorphisis.

Challenge 2: The lake is uncooperative.

I rode the bike over there Monday night. I stood in the deepest part of the pond. And I stayed perfectly dry. Not only had the pond dried up completely, but the parks department had mowed the lake bed.

This is what the lake looks like on the app I am using to track my bike rides.

This is what the lake looks like on Google Earth.

This is what the lake looks like when you are standing in the middle of it. I caught the tadpoles near the telephone pole in the distance.

I guess my wife is right. The tadpoles are smarter than me and they know when they have it good. They get bloodworms and algae wafers on a regular basis. Food, temperature, water quality, predators, and evaporation are dealt with by the goofy bike rider, and at least one them must've read enough Thomas Wolfe to know You Can't Go Home Again.

May you find something to feel better near.