Frozen Frogs

[Littlesparrow]

This afternoon as the temperatures have been above freezing for a couple of days in Cheshire, I checked my frog pond, only to find all the large frogs have died, frozen to death. This is very distressing,my pond is a medium sized one and I have never known this to happen before.
Is anyone else having a problem with frozen frogs.http://www.wildaboutbritain.co.uk/fo...lies/frown.gif

[aeshna5]

I can understand how distressing this must be. How deep is your pond? The deepest part should ideally be at least 45 cm depth.

Another possibility is that with a thick ice level for some days there may have been a build up of noxious gases from rotting vegetation below the ice.

Normally frogs can withstand cold periods- they do occur in the Highlands of Scotland. Hopefully others have hibernated above ground somewhere away from the worst of the elements.

[Littlesparrow]

my pond does have a deep section more than 45cm deep and I put a board over one end to try to keep one end free from ice, but we have had at least a month of freezing temperatures -4c and -7c, the canal and lake have both been frozen enough to stand on.

[aeshna5]

I don't think there's much else you can do. Animal mortality is often high in severe winters, but populations usually recover if the habitat is still there.

[Lindsay-c]

Help Frogs Survive the Winter

How To Attract Frogs To Your Garden Pond And Keep Them There - Wildlife Gardener (UK)

BBC - Autumnwatch Blog: Snow Watch: Your ponds in the Big Thaw

http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/xexexexex...-cold-we.shtml

Winter Tip for Your Pond

Hope these sites help for future reference. Generally just say to make sure the pond is deep enough (so there will always be a sufficient amount of water below the layer of ice. To thaw part of the ice to keep oxygen levels of water up and to release other gases. And there are conflicting opinions on the sites - the first 2/3 suggest leaving debris, leaves and other organic matter in the pond for the frogs to bury into so it is slightly warmer but the last site warns against it in case the decaying matter causes problems to the wildlife in the pond...
You will find on a couple of the sites they will suggest putting tubes and other objects into the pond for shelter

Not really much you can do but worth a try and sorry to hear that some of the frogs haven't made it

[Ukwildlifeo]

This blog (by one of the pond conservation workers) makes interesting reading, with a related article on frogs under ice.
http://xexexexexexexexexexexexexexex...-frog-science/

and another about a supposedly frozen frog on this post
http://xexexexexexexexexexexexexexex...eze-continues/

[Littlesparrow]

Sorry ukwildlifeo my computer doesn't seem to be able to pick up your link, not sure why.

[Littlesparrow]

Looking at the links, I'm not sure if there is anything else I could have done apart from stirring up the water some how to oxygenate it, I will look into this before anymore bad weather. I haven't found any small dead frogs so I hope they are somewhere else in the garden and have survived but it looks like my breading frogs could have been wipe.d out for next spring

[Mark_b]

Originally Posted by Littlesparrow

but it looks like my breading frogs could have been wipe.d out for next spring

Honestly don't worry too much.

1. Females don't normally hibernate at the bottom of water bodies.

2. Not all males in a population hibernate at the bottom either ...

So there still should be plenty of sexually mature frogs in your area.

[Littlesparrow]

Heres hoping Mark. The pond smelt better today and I didn't find anymore dead frogs, some of the worms have died, but not all of them.