Down in the pond and the ravine this morning, toads were trilling away. This will continue for some time yet as mating frenzy heats up, and then... silence as the toads leave the water and retreat back to the upland areas. Also in the pond, a smallish painted turtle completely ignoring our newly-made turtle raft!

There were four of these frogs in the BYG pond, as there were last year, so I'm assuming that they overwintered safely and these are the same four we last saw in the fall. We saw this one and the other three at the end of the guided walk.