March 21, 2012

This afternoon and evening I conducted surveys for calling frogs east of Peterborough and into adjacent Hastings and Northumberland Counties. I was primarily checking known sites for Western Chorus Frog (COSEWIC Threatened) based on records in the Ontario Herpetofaunal Summary database, but generally stopping at wetlands to listen for frogs. As expected with the amazingly mild weather of the past week, early calling frog species were widespread. At 115 stops where I had frogs (mostly calling but also some alive (AOR) or dead on the road, DOR), I had Spring Peepers calling at 97 stops, Chorus Frogs at 32 stops (haven