Pond Life Stirring

[kazy]

Originally Posted by Stomperone

I am pleased to say that I have four really large clumps of frogspawn in my pond which I only dug last year..

This may seem a silly question but do frogs spawn if there are no males present?
I only ask because I have not seen many frogs in the garden and was wondering if the spawn will be fertile or is it a case of wait and see.

Another question my pond has recently gone green despite the pump/filter.. The spawn that is there is sort of covered in a thin layer of green sediment for want of a better description... Will this be ok or is there something I need to do?

hi new here
i was wondering i am in plymouth too and wanted to know where i could get some frog spawn and pond water to start my nature off in my new pond in the garden as someone told me that it might help to get some water from a pond that is established


thank you

[shotski]

Originally Posted by kazy

hi new here
i was wondering i am in plymouth too and wanted to know where i could get some frog spawn and pond water to start my nature off in my new pond in the garden as someone told me that it might help to get some water from a pond that is established


thank you

Hi Kazy,

If I was you I would dig the pond (make it shallow at the edges) fill it with
tapwater and a good selection of plants and then leave it till next spring.
now is the best time to dig a new pond so it can establish for next year but
dont be tempted by fish if you want wildlife. The frogs will then come to you,
but if they dont I see no harm in taking a little spawn from a friends pond
next spring just make sure you take a selection to avoid inter breeding.

Shotski

[King Edward]

Hi Kazy,

If you have already made the pond, it would be interesting to see a photo of how it's doing at the moment. Start a new thread in either this section or the Pond Life one if you do, rather than joining on to an old thread.

Originally Posted by shotski

The frogs will then come to you,
but if they dont I see no harm in taking a little spawn from a friends pond
next spring just make sure you take a selection to avoid inter breeding.

If you were going to introduce some spawn from a nearby pond, it might actually be best to wait until the tadpole stage so that you could take a more of a mixed selection of tadpoles with different parents (or, I suppose, small handfuls of eggs from several spawn clumps rather than just one or two whole clumps), so that you maximise the diversity of frogs that result.

Either way, it would be best to wait and see if any frogs/newts arrive naturally in the meantime.

[shotski]

very good point KE I was waiting for the do gooders to shoot me down
for daring to suggest moving some spawn

[Kayleigh]

Originally Posted by shotski

very good point KE I was waiting for the do gooders to shoot me down
for daring to suggest moving some spawn

We are not "do gooders" there is good reason for not moving spawn but if its not too far then its no problem, you don't want to wipe out all the frogs you have by introducing disease to the ones you already have.

[kazy]

we have dug out the earth and placed an old bath at the top so its pretty big
with rocks in the bottom and half filled it with normal water and its been raining a lot so rain water as well
we already have a frog in a very very small pond that was here before

thank you for the advise everyone and will try to take pics of it all from start to finish
kazy

[King Edward]

If you already have frogs then hopefully they will arrive and spawn of their own accord.

I suspect there is rather too much emphasis on amphibian diseases being spread by spawn movement, when these same diseases can also be spread on pond plants, pond nets and other equipment, and quite likely just on footwear when visiting different ponds.