Tarrytown, NY ~ March 21-22, 2012
SPRING PEEPERS
Tarrytown, NY ~ March 21-22, 2012
In the woods
near where I live is a swamp that is home to a spectacular chorus of spring
peepers. I visited the swamp in March 2012 to make some audio recordings which can be found here
and here.
I apologize for the less than stellar quality. I wore the microphone against my
jacket so I could use my body to block noise coming from the very-close-by
Thruway and there are some unintended rustling sounds. I made the second tape
with every effort to reduce that rustling and I did not touch the microphone at
all, but even still the slightest movements were picked up. A recording produced
with the microphone left unguarded near the ground picked up more noise from the
highway and less of the peeps. I would have preferred a tape with no highway noise
of course, but after a while I found those sounds to be interesting too.
I can make out three
distinct sounds from the peepers: the bright peep sound, a rapid buzzer-like noise of high
and low pitches, and an irregular guttural; squibbling noise.
I was also able
to photograph some of the suspect noise makers, as seen here. Be forewarned of a
slightly gross photograph towards the end.
UPDATE MAY 2014: I have since received email that these are Common American
Toads, not Spring Peepers.
I found this guy in the middle of the road. I went in for
some close-up photos under the glare of the streetlights.
From this angle I began to think that something was wrong
with this scene.
I used my flashlight to illuminate this photograph. I saw
this mess and I began to think the frog was dead.
He didn't move or flinch or anything like the other frogs did.
There is all sorts of nasty weird stuff going on in this
picture. There is the purple caviar-like mess, a red liquid that could be blood,
some black thing (a bug?) sticking out of the frogs mouth, and a feather
seed-like white fan stuck on the outside of the frog's mouth. I would like to
know exactly what is going on here.
The swamp where the frogs live.
This page copyright © 2007 by Robert J. Yasinsac.
Reproduction of these photos without the permission of Robert Yasinsac is
prohibited.
