that is incredibly tempting for the mere fact that i would love to throw them in the creek behind the house to eat the mosquitos. they'd get washed away at the first rain.

curious, i take it you live in one of the houses on Hill or Kelly? i pass by every day, and leave about 12 blocks to your southeast (other side of zoo from you).

I am a couple of exits west of the zoo- My house is about halfway between the University exit on 85 and the Lowery(formerly Ashby) exit on 20.

There are a few spots near my job where rain water gathers and frogs keep laying eggs-but the water dries up sometimes-so, at those times, I do tadpole rescue missions and scoop up as many wriggly little tadpoles before they dry out. I have been putting them in my pond and now have had to put them in various other containers. Some of them have back legs and a few have frogged. Not sure what kind they are-maybe green/bronze frogs or wood frogs? Hard to tell when they are little. Just trying to do my part in the conservation of amphibians...but my little pond can't support hundreds of frogs and they will just start hopping off in search of a less crowded spot and will most likely be eaten by birds en route.

Anyway, I love having froggy sounds(and other nature sounds) in the city. One of my pond frogs has lived in my pond since last summer and he/she is hardly ever scared of me-I toss worms his way and so I think he associates my presence with free worms now.

Animal behavior is interesting, and it's amazing to me how tame they can be! I'm almost tempted to build a pond myself. I would do anything to counter the mosquitoes, which are UNBEARABLE right now.

After years of drought-it's great to have rain...but I am not happy about the mosquito situation. I need some dragonflies and bats to take up residence here.

I have found that it's pretty easy to keep a small pond as long as you have plenty of aquatic plants and NO KOI(they are destructive/gobbling up the live plants and they create a lot of waste requiring serious filtration-besides...goldfish-fantails, shebunken, etc get just as big, colorful and pretty in my opinion)-just goldfish. I have one little bog garden that is just a 20 gallon container with various plants in it-there is no filter or pump-the plants do all the work. I have had a couple of mosquito fish, aquatic snails, and platys(I think they are the same as guppies-they come in various colors and are at any pet store), and of course a million tadpoles living happily there for two or three months now. The water is very clear and the fish just eat mosquito larvae, algae and whatever else grows/shows up there. Sometimes I sprinkle flake food in there-or if I find mosquito larvae in standing water-I scoop them up with a little net and put them in the water and watch the fish chase them down.

I have a pre-formed pond too, with a waterfall and my goldfish are in there. I am addicted now though...and want to build a bigger pond and make my pre-formed pond into the dedicated frog pond.

Wow, I am rattling on...I think I do that when I'm tired!