VII 

 THE FROG'S YEAR 



SPEAKING of our British frog, Rana tempo- 

 raria, Dr. Gadow writes : " Next to Man there 

 is no animal which has been studied so minutely, 

 and has had so many primers and text-books written 

 on it, as this frog. In spite of all this it is very 

 little understood.' 1 Perhaps there may be some 

 interest, therefore, in following its familiar life- 

 cycle round the year. In Scotland it is usually in 

 March that the frogs leave their winter-quarters 

 and betake themselves from near or far to standing 

 or slowly flowing water. The winter-quarters are 

 described by Gadow in the Cambridge Natural 

 History as "mostly holes in the ground, under 

 moss, or in the mud," and Mr. O. H. Latter, in his 

 Natural History of some Common Animals, speaks 

 of our frogs as hibernating "some in holes and 

 drain-pipes, others in or on the mud at the bottom 

 of ponds." In his Ray Society monograph Dr. 

 Boulenger says that " many males hibernate under 

 water." It seems, then, that the grass-frog's habits 

 vary considerably in different parts of its very wide 

 range, and that some of them pass the winter in 

 sheltered recesses far from the water. It should be 

 noted that the grass-frog's near relative, the common 



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