Despite the lack of rain, the tree frogs have been calling every night from our small pond.

The croak calls are the tree frogs; the sweeter trill is an American toad.

In the morning, about a dozen small clutches of eggs were floating on the water surface.

Cope's gray tree frog eggs. The whole cluster is about as big as a my thumbnail.

The eggs will hatch in less than a week, then the tadpoles will take another month or so to develop. To make sure that the ducks don’t destroy all the eggs, I have scooped some of the eggs masses out of the pond. I’m keeping them in a bucket until they hatch, then I’ll return the tadpoles to the pond. Ducks don’t seem to be good at catching tadpoles.