Amphibians and Tears in my eys�

2002-03-30

I went shopping last weekend. And it made me cry.

For the past several years (ask my husband, dragged him on more tadpole hunts than I care to think about) I've gone on tadpole hunts every spring. It's probably been closer to ten years, but I haven't gone every year.

I hear the frogs/toads croaking, but I see nary a tadpole. Not for the last ten years.

When I was a girl I broke every rule my parents set and went tadpole hunting in the local ditch (read stream/river/storm drain, depending on where you're from). Tiny toadlings haunted the streets when I was small. The only time I've ever hit anyone in anger was when I was nine, and my friends six year old brother pulled the leg off of one of my toadlings. I remember shaking and crying afterwards. I couldn't believe anyone would do that. But I hit him first. I'd do it again, in a nanosecond.

I went to the fish store last weekend and bought tadpoles. Bullfrog tadpoles. Probably not a chance in hell that they'll survive their infancy. I probably should know better. I do know better.

Bought some newts, too. I keep finding them sunning themselves on the water lily leaves. I'm pretty sure they won't survive the cats, but they've given me more pleasure in a week than months of having them in an aquarium.

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