It’s when I know things are starting to really warm up a bit. That Spring is not just a concept. It is actually starting.
For some, it might be the spring peepers. As much as I enjoy hearing them, those little guys will put up with some pretty chilly weather in the early spring. And the peepers have been around for a few weeks now. Huge herds of them, from the sound. It’s almost deafening some nights.
But the one I tend to listen for is the wood frogs. They tend to start a little later. When the warmth gets a bit more consistent. Although the last couple of days have probably slowed them down a bit.
It took me a while to figure out what these things are. When I first heard them, I thought they were ducks. Not really loud quacking ducks. More like ducks muttering under the breath a bit. But still a sort of duck like sound.
I even sat beside a little pond for a while, trying to figure out where these ducks were and what sort of ducks they might be.
I never saw any ducks.
And still the sound persisted. Although if you moved, they would go quiet very quickly. Whatever the mystery ghost ducks were, they seemed very sensitive to anything moving around.
It took a while, but it was the sound that finally allowed me to track them down. I found the sound, which told me what I was hearing. They were not ducks. They were frogs. Wood frogs.
I listen for the wood frogs every spring. They tend to come a bit later than the peepers, and you can often hear them during the day, doing their best duck imitations, calling other wood frogs to come check out the goods.
Anyway, I heard a few wood frogs last weekend. So now I know. Spring is here.
