Kitchen Garden Forum

I have just attempted to walk across my lawn and there are literally so many Frogs and Young Toads crawling and hopping about, simply too many to even start counting. Luckily I was just about to step off the concrete path onto the lawn and fortunately realised the lawn was moving.
I didn't know that Toads would mix with Frogs but both are certainly present. Some of them are less than an inch (25mm) long and others are almost twice that size.
When I went to walk back they were then on the concrete path and my back porch is now full of them. I had to pick my way carefully and go round the house and enter through the front door. Lucky my keys were in my pocked 'cos the front is always on the Yale lock.
I have never known the like before. We always get a few but nothing on this scale before. We have no pond and the nearest ditch is about 300 yds away across the paddock and one other field. I simply do not understand it. They are probably migrating but from where to where I have no idea.
JB.

Perhaps it is a biblical style plague upon you following your comments on another thread ...

LOL or you have a super larder of slugs etc in your garden.

Hi Tony,
That I like!
JB.

Johnboy - warning

Watch out for the locusts

Hi NB,
Strangely I have had no slug damage to speak of this year. I do use Organic slug pellets, one application when plants are planted out, but nothing after that. I do have some resident Toads and sort of captive Hedgehogs inside my 5 acre rabbit fence But I suspect they find ways of getting in and out. I have not lost a single plant that could be attributed to slugs. So far I have not suffered any Pea Moth damage this year and I now have about 90lbs in one freezer and no sprays of any kind used this year!

Hi Alan,
Had an altercation with a swarm of Locusts in my flying days which was to say the least a bit Hairy!
JB.

Hi Johnboy, strangely this is the first year I have ever had pea moth, how do I prevent it next year? Netting? Normally I pick peas frequently but the ones with the pea moth were a purple sport of giant mange tout I was saving them for seed and letting them dry on the vines, maybe that is why?

Hi NB,
Here I do absolutely nothing against Pea Moth. We have a Purple Tall Pea which has been grown for seed this year which has no commercial name
and there is no sign on those either but a really very heavy crop.
I have a row of Clive's Pea 'Radio' grown for seed which is yet to be picked in about a months time or maybe even a little longer and there is no sign of Pea Moth.
We had a few Pea Moth last year which affected only the Hurst Greenshaft but none on them this year.
I suppose what I am saying is that it is luck more than anything.
BTW I never pick anything for seed until the plant has started to degrade and has gone brown. The Peas are then picked and taken into one of the tunnels to dry completely and are laid out on a specially a prepared bench which is vermin proof with a sheet of light polythene over the top of the wire cage which prevents damage by vermin urine which they have experienced in the past.
JB.

Absolutely no sign of a Frog or Toad of any description this morning.
They have simply disappeared! They were all moving in a north westerly direction yesterday so I have just walked about half a mile out in that direction and back by a different route still nor a one to be seen.
JB.

Hi Johnboy

Maybe they were wending their way west to watery Wales

I wonder will you end up with any togs or froads?

There was a piece in the Telegraph yesterday - Week-end section - I think about the migration of toads. A village somewhere has set up a toad patrol to rescue the hundreds of toats which are currently crossing the roads in their village to get from somewhere to somewhere else. And they have to do it all again in Spring where the toads start migrating again. Sounds like it's time to build lots of woodpiles and twiggy/leafy places for them to hibernate during winter.

We usually find loads when we empty our compost heap. We have also found frogs in the frog of bricks that are used around the plot - wonder if this is where the name comes from.

I found three frogs lurking around in the garden whilst weeding today and I'm wondering at what point (i.e. low night temperature) they start going into hibernation as none of them were particularly active.

I want to dig out one of my compost cages tomorrow and get the stuff onto a bare patch I've managed to clear in my vegetable patch. Am worried I might find a few frogs in there which have gone into early hibernation. I don't want to disturb them but need the heap cleared and hope that starting off a new cage with lots of loose material will give them a new hibernating place if they need it. Do frogs survive if they get disturbed in hibernation, or is it still to early in the autumn for me to be worrying about this?