Unidentified milky white matter in pond ...

[mudpixie]

HI

I've come across this milky white matter in my garden pond, in Cornwall. There are no fish in the pond but loads of newts, frogs and toads. Does anyone know what this stuff is and whether I should leave it be or fish it out??


Any help appreciated!
Thanks

[yorkieuk]

Maybe frogspawn that has died??? I dont really know. But im sure someone of here will have the right answer soon enough

[mudpixie]

Didn't think of that ... We do have lots of frogspawn but that is all at the shallow end of the pond - this is at the deeper end if that's any help!

[nightshade]

That will be frosting or extreme cold which makes the spawn milky which usually kills it

[Red Robin]

^^^^
But how would the frogspawn be effected by frost if it's at the deep end? Or is the deeper end fairly shallow?

[mudpixie]

The deeper end of the pond is about 30cms.
Here is an image of the pond..


As you can see, bottom shallow end covered in frogspawn. The red circle indicates where I found the two glodules of white matter. (The pump is not on in the pond).

Thinking about it I have had spawn damaged by frost and it went milky but didn't look like what I found today, also we haven't had the pond freeze since we've had the spawn - or can it be damaged by just being cold and nearly freezing?

Thanks for looking

[tom00_uk]

looks like unfertilised spawn thats now infected with a fungus and rotting

[mudpixie]

ahhh, thank you My curiosity has been sated!

[werdnal]

Originally Posted by mudpixie

The deeper end of the pond is about 30cms.
Here is an image of the pond..


As you can see, bottom shallow end covered in frogspawn. The red circle indicates where I found the two glodules of white matter. (The pump is not on in the pond).

Thinking about it I have had spawn damaged by frost and it went milky but didn't look like what I found today, also we haven't had the pond freeze since we've had the spawn - or can it be damaged by just being cold and nearly freezing?

Thanks for looking

Spawn can get "frosted" even if the water isn't actually frozen. Our pond is spring fed and rarely freezes even in the cold weather we had before Christmas. But this week we have a few patches of spawn which are right on the surface, that are turning white and will probably fail to hatch.

I agree the white stuff you have found looked like unfertilised spawn, as there is no central black dot where the tadpole would develop. I found a clump of this in our field last year - it looked like wallpaper paste, and having asked the question here, I summised that our local buzzard who frequents the field looking for worms, may have predated a pregnant female, who dropped her spawn when caught.

If you don't mind me asking, where abouts in Cornwall are you? I'm near Roche!

[mudpixie]

Fished it out today and wallpaper paste is a very good description! (I'm down near-ish Truro).