Wednesday, November 6, 2019

Wild Wednesday ~ Little Visitor

A few of weeks ago, as a nor'easter prepared to blow through, I dragged all our houseplants inside. We'd already had a couple of frosts, and, though the plants were mostly protected by the exhuberant growth of a kiwi vine that's taken over our deck in a Little Shop of Horrors-esque fashion, they were starting to glare at me in an accusatory fashion for neglecting them.

The next day, I heard a strange and surprising sound coming from the sunroom, where the plants live: Peep-peep-peep-peep.

I knew that spring peepers occassionally call during the waning days of fall, lamenting, I assume, the onset of winter. I did not know that they occassionally take up residence in houseplants and thereby move into the homes of unsuspecting humans.

I scurried to the sunroom, but the peeping had stopped by the time I got there, and with a couple dozen plants, all overgrown from a summer outdoors, there was no way I was going to find a frog the size of my thumbnail. And so it went over the next week: Peep-peep-peep-peep. Scurry. Silence. I tried playing a peeper chorus from my frog songs CD. I tried combing out dead leaves from the plants and pruning back excessive vegetation. I tried misting them with water to imitate a light rain. No luck.

Finally, after about a week, I made it to the sunroom in time to narrow the call down to the southeast corner. I took the plants from that corner and spread them out, and thus triangulated my way to the call the next time I heard it, finding the little scamp hiding under the succulent leaf of an aloe vera plant. At this point it was late in the day and getting a little chilly out, and I decided to wait until the warmest part of the following day to escort the stowaway outside. Unfortunately, when I went to release him, I found he had absconded to another plant and again I couldn't find him.

I was a little worried that the frog was getting dehydrated, so I lightly watered the plants and waited for the giveaway peep-peep. But it came less frequently and for shorter intervals than it had before. Had I squandered its last chance for survival? Finally, one day nearly a week after I first found the frog, I was able to narrow the call down to a small area of the room and found the peeper hiding between the inner and outer pot of another aloe vera plant.

It was a cold, damp day, but I wasn't taking any chances with the frog relocating itself again, so I took it outside, across the driveway, released it among the damp leaves that it's so well-camouflaged with, and wished it well in its upcoming hibernation and return next spring.

2 comments:

  1. Years ago when I lived in Augusta I was cutting the late blooms from my favorite lisianthus plants in the garden. A tiny little pink peeper was hidden in a pink blossom. He was so loud in the house. I kept him in a little critter keeper all winter until spring. I was feeding him regular crickets from the pet store and "shake n' baking" the crickets in a nutrient powder for frogs. I can't remember what it was. I called him Mr. Peepers,of course. When he exercised his voice it almost sounded like we had a giant exotic bird in the house. I had his keeper on my vanity in the bedroom. I loved to put the live powdered crickets in his habitat and watch him hunt and grab them,and when their little legs would be twitching between his lips,he would fan his "hand" across his mouth and sweep them in before he swallowed.
    He was so much fun to care for and he survived to be released when the spring warmth arrived.

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    Replies
    1. That's so cool! I wish I'd known. I couldn't find any info online about what it would take to overwinter a peeper!

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