mistressofmuses (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
mistressofmuses) wrote2025-07-19 07:09 pm
mistressofmuses) wrote2025-07-19 07:09 pm
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Tuesday, July 08: Hudson Gardens (Part 2)
I took too many pictures while we were at Hudson Gardens last week, so had to split up the post a bit.
Here is Part 2: The Critters!
Mostly, I'd been hoping we would see frogs, because there were loads of tadpoles when we were there in the spring, but we were too early for frogs.
We were not too early for frogs this time! This was my favorite bullfrog of the day, who was surprisingly chill about me taking pictures.
Found along the lake shore, a fairly recent shed snake skin! Almost certainly a garter snake.
Over past the beehives, the little holding pond is full of water and plants again! We heard one tell-tale "eep! plop" of a bullfrog, but upon looking closely at the pond, discovered there were also quite a few of the tiniest possible froglets.
What is that between the plants?
Let's look a bit closer...
Hmm...
Eeeeeven closer...
The tiniest frog!!
Another tiny!frog. (Just below the stem of the lily pad in the middle, the one with the curled leaf.)
Two more tiny frogs!
The tiny frogs are far too small to be bullfrogs. I feel like they're even a bit too small to be leopard frogs, based on what I remember of the one I raised from a tadpole when I was a kid. They could be toads like Berry Mad, since I think they do start out very small, or possibly chorus frogs.
The other thing there were a ton of...
Baby crayfish! So many baby crayfish! More baby crayfish than I have ever seen!
Still some big bullfrog tadpoles, too.
Another fun aquatic baby: a damselfly nymph!
A kingfisher!
Then up to the lily pond...
A nice big bullfrog under the lily pads! And such stripey legs.
A much smaller bullfrog.
Another shot of the very big, very chill bullfrog from above the cut.
A nice big crayfish, marching along the water line.
Not as intense as the claws I found up at Pine Valley Ranch, but you can see the blue claws!
Another bullfrog, sitting on the waterfall between levels of the pond.
On a fence post, a cicada husk.
One last big bullfrog, on the muddy bank.
One last bonus picture,
This is "Esmeralda" or "Esme" for short. She lives in the window well outside of my mom's basement. My mom sent me this picture the same day we went to the gardens: Esme had three big egg sacs! (According to mom, she has since laid a fourth.) She is an attentive mother, rotating the egg sacs and moving them around the web over the course of each day. My mom has been enjoying watching her.
My mom said that her research on black widows and their egg-laying said that they only live about a year once they're fully mature, which makes me feel slightly better about how short a time I had Ophelia... perhaps it really was just her time.
Here is Part 2: The Critters!
Mostly, I'd been hoping we would see frogs, because there were loads of tadpoles when we were there in the spring, but we were too early for frogs.
We were not too early for frogs this time! This was my favorite bullfrog of the day, who was surprisingly chill about me taking pictures.
Found along the lake shore, a fairly recent shed snake skin! Almost certainly a garter snake.
Seventeen pictures of various critters, lots of frogs and crayfish, plus others:
Over past the beehives, the little holding pond is full of water and plants again! We heard one tell-tale "eep! plop" of a bullfrog, but upon looking closely at the pond, discovered there were also quite a few of the tiniest possible froglets.
What is that between the plants?
Let's look a bit closer...
Hmm...
Eeeeeven closer...
The tiniest frog!!
Another tiny!frog. (Just below the stem of the lily pad in the middle, the one with the curled leaf.)
Two more tiny frogs!
The tiny frogs are far too small to be bullfrogs. I feel like they're even a bit too small to be leopard frogs, based on what I remember of the one I raised from a tadpole when I was a kid. They could be toads like Berry Mad, since I think they do start out very small, or possibly chorus frogs.
The other thing there were a ton of...
Baby crayfish! So many baby crayfish! More baby crayfish than I have ever seen!
Still some big bullfrog tadpoles, too.
Another fun aquatic baby: a damselfly nymph!
A kingfisher!
Then up to the lily pond...
A nice big bullfrog under the lily pads! And such stripey legs.
A much smaller bullfrog.
Another shot of the very big, very chill bullfrog from above the cut.
A nice big crayfish, marching along the water line.
Not as intense as the claws I found up at Pine Valley Ranch, but you can see the blue claws!
Another bullfrog, sitting on the waterfall between levels of the pond.
On a fence post, a cicada husk.
One last big bullfrog, on the muddy bank.
One last bonus picture,
of a black widow at my mom's house:
This is "Esmeralda" or "Esme" for short. She lives in the window well outside of my mom's basement. My mom sent me this picture the same day we went to the gardens: Esme had three big egg sacs! (According to mom, she has since laid a fourth.) She is an attentive mother, rotating the egg sacs and moving them around the web over the course of each day. My mom has been enjoying watching her.
My mom said that her research on black widows and their egg-laying said that they only live about a year once they're fully mature, which makes me feel slightly better about how short a time I had Ophelia... perhaps it really was just her time.
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Some of the bullfrogs were very big! Soup bowl sized, ha.
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It sounds like a nice time ~
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You spotted a teeny frog!
The one time I spotted snakeskin on a trial I got upset because I thought it was plastic litter at first.
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The teeny ones were So teeny!
Haha, I'm glad it turned out to be snakeskin! It's a shame that 99 times out of 100 it WOULD be plastic litter. :/