I'm almost a little embarassed to post this....oh, well.
Our home sits on a city lot... 80 x 100. About 10 years ago, I decided to become eco-friendly and started converting all our back lawn into garden space. Along the east side is a large shade garden, the north a conglomeration of bushes (currants, honeysuckle, dogwood, forsythia), the west side is a mixture of flowers (black-eyed susan, roses, spiderwort and red raspberry bushes) and the middle has been converted into a sun garden. The only grass left is under my clothes lines which are infrequently used and may be used to begin a grape arbor....I've gone nuts but I love gardening! In order to be certified as a natural wildlife habitat, I added a pond, wood pile, and native plants. But in all the 22 years we've lived here, I have never once seen a toad or frog.
Now I grew up in the country....frogs and toads were a part of the ecosystem. In fact, my dreaded fear when I was cutting the grass was running over one of the little suckers
and killing or amputating legs...which unfortunately I did a number of times. So living in an area without toads was different. At one point, I considered 'appropriating' a few from a park and seeing if they would live in our yard, but decided that wasn't a good idea. If they didn't live there why would I import a few to die?
Well, last week Bob called me over and there in the middle of my lily of the valley plants was a little toad...I was ecstatic! I smiled most of the day. I know, you're thinking....simple pleasures for simple minds! (me, too!)
This morning, I went out to feed the fish (that's another story entirely) in the pond and what do I see?? A toad swimming around in the pond! Unfortunatey, it had no way of getting out.....so dressed in my work clothes and already 15 minutes late for work, I begin to build a 'toad ramp' to make sure my new found friends don't croak (sorry) in the water!
Nice to know the eco-friendly features are starting to pay off!
Our home sits on a city lot... 80 x 100. About 10 years ago, I decided to become eco-friendly and started converting all our back lawn into garden space. Along the east side is a large shade garden, the north a conglomeration of bushes (currants, honeysuckle, dogwood, forsythia), the west side is a mixture of flowers (black-eyed susan, roses, spiderwort and red raspberry bushes) and the middle has been converted into a sun garden. The only grass left is under my clothes lines which are infrequently used and may be used to begin a grape arbor....I've gone nuts but I love gardening! In order to be certified as a natural wildlife habitat, I added a pond, wood pile, and native plants. But in all the 22 years we've lived here, I have never once seen a toad or frog.
Now I grew up in the country....frogs and toads were a part of the ecosystem. In fact, my dreaded fear when I was cutting the grass was running over one of the little suckers
and killing or amputating legs...which unfortunately I did a number of times. So living in an area without toads was different. At one point, I considered 'appropriating' a few from a park and seeing if they would live in our yard, but decided that wasn't a good idea. If they didn't live there why would I import a few to die?Well, last week Bob called me over and there in the middle of my lily of the valley plants was a little toad...I was ecstatic! I smiled most of the day. I know, you're thinking....simple pleasures for simple minds! (me, too!)
This morning, I went out to feed the fish (that's another story entirely) in the pond and what do I see?? A toad swimming around in the pond! Unfortunatey, it had no way of getting out.....so dressed in my work clothes and already 15 minutes late for work, I begin to build a 'toad ramp' to make sure my new found friends don't croak (sorry) in the water!
Nice to know the eco-friendly features are starting to pay off!
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