RAUK - Archived Forum - fat newts!

This has been a different year to last year in my pond (last year was my first year here).

Both years my toads bred very early but this year all their eggs seemed to go mouldy.  Then there was a lull and although female toads and frogs were around there seemed to be no actual breeding.  Eventually, in early March I found healthy looking strings and spawn.  Unlike last year however, there seemed to be no frogs 'looking after' the spawn.

I keep looking at the frog spawn and I have noticed that it is disappearing fast.  I know I have read that newts eat it and that is what appears to be happening in my pond.  I don't recall reading that newts eat toad strings though, but even they seem to be being targeted.  My newts are hugely fat and healthy looking and there seem to be an awful lot of them, and some of the males already have their black paddle feet.

Is this climate change/climate confusion in action, or is this a normal pond cycle?

Sounds normal to me, particularly in a smallish pond where the newts don't have to go looking for the spawn.  Frog spawn is the equivalent of a buffet supper for newts.   At one site I regularly visit, which has lot of Frogs and lots of Cresties the frogs lay vey few clumps of spawn in the main pond and I very rarely see tadpoles - I think the Cresties eat them all.  The frohs do much better in some of the smaller, shallower ponds and ditches nearby where there are no Cresties.

Matt

all our newts love to suck out the embryos; in my experience they are beaten by alpine newts which I once watched clear all the visible embryos from a clump of frogspawn in minutes

Sorry forgotten how to upload  picture!

The spawn appeared about 5th March but I have had frogs in the pond since some time in Feb.  It took a few days for all the spawn to go, I was noticing the embroys disappearing at first, now they are all gone but the jelly is still here.  The newts were just crawling over the outside of the clump at first but then seemed to be inside it.

I remember last year that the spawn was laid very quickly after the first frogs appeared and developed into tadpoles very quickly, just not sure how quickly (new to this lark so didn't realise importance of keeping notes last year).  I'm wondering if the frogs left it so long to actually mate because they were waiting for favourable conditions where the tadpoles would develop quickly.  Looking at last years pictures compared to this, the clump of spawn last year looked much rounder and ball shaped, this year's looked flatter and more spread out, and as I said, last year the spawn was guarded by male frogs all the time, even in daylight, this year they seemed to abandon it.

The other thing I don't know is whether the tadpoles I had last year were toad or frog ones, I assumed they were a mixture of the two but haven't learnt how to ID them yet, so no idea if any frogs actually survived.

To Gemma, is it possible the newts are trying to protect their eggs from frogs 'getting revenge'?!!!

[QUOTE=Caleb] [QUOTE=GemmaJF]The whole clump was gone by the following morning.[/QUOTE]

Does that include the jelly, or did they leave that behind?

Thanks for the extra detail, Will- very interesting.

This is making me wonder whether the main function of newts' folding of leaves around their eggs is to protect them from other newts...[/QUOTE]

The whole clump was gone, they were just tearing into it and eating it, jelly the lot. I found it quite amazing as when I kept smooth newts when I was younger they only tended to eat things that wriggled even in the aquatic stage, so I was a bit suprised to see this first hand. It explains a lot regarding newly built ponds often having a fast growing frog population, only for this to crash a few years later when newts arrive. Part of natures system I guess.

The whole clump was gone, they were just tearing into it and eating it, jelly the lot.