Pacific chorus frog ~ 07/15/12 ~ at home

Pacific chorus frog / Sierran chorus frog / Pacific treefrog
Pseudacris sierra (also Pseudacris regilla and Hyla regilla)

This is the first healthy adult form juvenile I've seen completely out of the water this year. It still has a tiny bit of tail that's not apparent in my early morning photo. In addition to the juvenile shown above, I have 5 tadpoles left swimming around from an original 16 that hatched last year at the end of May. Yes, you read that correctly, I've been keeping the same tadpoles outside for almost 14 months now. Several online sites (see embedded links in the IDs above) state Pacific chorus frogs metamorphose within 2 to 2½ months and according to Wikipedia up to 5 months in captivity. Perhaps it's the artificial conditions I provided (variously a standard goldfish bowl, an extra large glass kitchen bowl, and a 5 gallon aquarium with either partially or fully changed fresh water every several weeks) that have kept them from transforming. My last full water change was last weekend.

So, over the course of the past year, I casually observed their feeding, development, and behavior that I haven't found specifically mentioned elsewhere online. In addition to sucking on algae, they voraciously eat duckweed roots, which leaves a considerable amount of leaf debris at the bottom of the containers. I've transferred this debris along with any remaining duckweed and a large algae covered rock with every full water change. The tadpoles seem to like burrowing themselves in the debris, and the almost-tranformed juveniles with all 4 legs will hide there for days while their tails get absorbed. After I switched out the 5 gallon aquarium for cold water white cloud minnows this past April, I started supplementing the tadpoles' diet with anacharis and small amounts of fish flakes. Other than one dead adult form juvenile, I haven't had anymore deaths. This has been nice for me, because it was rather gruesome to watch how the tadpoles aggressively scavenge dead bodies, including squashed bladder snails (bred like rabbits and were very difficult to eradicate). The tadpoles get quite bulky, approximately 3 times the size of the ½ inch juvenile shown here. The hind feet gradually appear first with very little change in body mass. Once the front leg stubs start showing, their body mass reduces quickly, and they get very twitchy, almost as if growing front legs is painful. Hmm, growing pains?

I'm hoping the remaining 5 tadpoles will successfully metamorphose. I'm still not sure what to do with the adults since my balcony is not likely suitable habitat, even though there are plenty of places to hide in and around planters and small flies from my compost bins. I do not want to randomly release them into the wild since Pacific chorus frogs could carry a fungus that can kill other amphibians. I may give them back to my friend who originally gave me the last of last year's seasonal batches of eggs. This year she found frog eggs as early as the end of January, 2 months earlier than the previous 2 years.

Pacific chorus frog ~ 06/30/11 ~ at home

Pacific chorus frog tadpole with bladder snail
Pseudacris sierra with Physa acuta

I've thoroughly enjoyed watching my tadpoles. Almost all of them were released from their egg sacs the day after I first posted pictures on 05/30/11 making them 1 month old. Most of the time they simply rest on the bottom of the aquarium, not too exciting. Around mid-morning and mid-afternoon they get more active. They eat duckweed roots as shown above and algae off the sides and bottom of the aquarium like miniature vacuums. Amazingly, they can float up without moving their tails. How do they regulate their buoyancy? I had to fiddle with the pictures above to show the details; it's really difficult to get clear pictures through glass and murky water. I have over 15 tadpoles and numerous snails which have already mated, laid eggs, and hatched young since I've had them. Does anyone know what kind of snail commonly comes with purchased pond plants? Speaking of which, the oxygenating plant (shown in the second pic) is not milfoil, but I forgot what it is.

ps 07/11/11 - The frilly plant floating in the second pic is rigid hornwort, aka coon's-tail (Ceratophyllum demersum). While this is a native plant in CA and elsewhere, I will be careful about how I dispose of this plant's parts as it can be considered invasive and easily propagates from fragments. As for the snail, I believe it is a bladder snail (Physa acuta, aka Physella acuta). It has a left-sided aperture (all Physa spp. have this), pointed spire (sharper than the other common aquarium tadpole snail), thin shell (I accidentally crushed one while taking a closer look), and small size of 3-12 mm (generally smaller than Physa gyrina). For now I'm going to keep the snails; they may end up being a good food source for when the tadpoles metamorphose.

pss 08/09/11 - For a much better picture of a pacific chorus frog tadpole, check out John Wall's Natural California.

pss 08/13/11 - For nice pictures of pacific chorus frogs out in the wild, check out Cindy at Bug Safari. She's quite a bit south from where I'm at. I don't know if I'll have any adults this year.

habitat ~ 05/23/10 ~ Frog Pond Wetland Preserve

Frog Pond Wetland Preserve

May 23, 2010

We were hiking maniacs this weekend, hitting Fort Ord, Jacks Peak, and the Frog Pond in 2 days. Of course, it helps that all are within a few minutes from home (not to mention we don't have a garden or kids to toil over). The Frog Pond is not a place I normally go, because the parking on the side of a very fast road makes me nervous. My hubby used to run this pond regularly at lunch, and he was surprised by the carpet of what we think is duckweed over the water.