Last night I took my cat for a walk down by the pond and he was busy trying to catch frogs, tadpoles and dragonflies. One frog was pretty smart and jut stayed perched on a floating cattail in the water instead of staying by the shore like the other frogs who would have to jump back into the water on the next loop my cat made around the pond.

When approached, green frogs will typically leap into the safety of the water while letting out a loud cry. Hence, the old nickname ‘the screaming frog’. Their normal call is explosive, prolonged, and low-pitched producing a twang similar to the sound of plucking the bass string of a banjo, usually given as a single note, but sometimes repeated several times. Usually I see the ripples in the water after their croak and spot them that way more than the sound.

Northern green frogs will eat any living things they can capture and swallow and are opportunistic feeders, who normally sit patiently in the water or close to shore and wait for prey. Apparently they couldn’t swallow my cat since he passed by several times without being eaten.

My pond is always full of tadpoles and now I know why since after the eggs hatch in 3 to 7 days, the green frog tadpoles take 2 to 22 months to metamorphosis into full grown frogs. And since there were so many in my pond that my cat had to try to catch, he was a rather muddy cat and I refused to carry him home so he wasn’t allowed to play that ‘I have a broken leg and can’t walk’ trick last night.

Perched Green Frog