Icing on the pond

I stood by the window looking at the backyard.  It looks cold... according to my thermometer it was cold. There was ice on the pond. 

My mind drifted to Leo the leopard frog.  We first met Leo in the early fall.  As with most creatures he just showed up one day.  As the weather cooled it became obvious that Leo was looking for a place to spend the winter.  He started nesting in a flower pot that was half submerged in the pond but after a week or so he gave that up and we found him in our raised garden.  I guess he didn’t like that either as he was later found under a rock near the waterfall I call Joe’s Station.

This is Leo the Leopard Frog.

As we prepared for the coming winter we seemed to scare Leo from his winter haven enough times that we thought he had moved to another yard as he was no where to be found. 

One fall day I was cleaning the pond.  My task this particular day was to remove string algae that was growing under the waterfalls.  I stopped the flow of water and then with a trash bucket, bottle of diluted bleach, scrub brush and knee pads I got to the task at hand.  I would remove the bulk of the algae by hand and then spray the remaining algae with the bleach solution only using the scrub brush for particularly stubborn Algae Klingons (aren’t all Klingons stubborn?).

I was just about finished and was spraying the bleach solution on the rocks to zap any algae I had not seen… the is a common military tactic when you can’t see the enemy.  Just spray the area with bullets, in my case the bullets were the bleach solution. 

I was spraying away without a care in the world when much to my surprise out came Leo from under one of the waterfall flat-stones.  He didn’t crawl out in typical frog fashion.  No sir, he came out of there like he was being chased by frog dogs (similar to pit bulls).  Now, if your not familiar with bejesus your lucky.  I’m sorry to report that I’m all too familiar with bejesus as I get it scared out of me at least 3 times a year… sometimes more than that.  I’m surprised I even have any bejesus left inside me!  This was one of those bejesus moments. 

Everyone has experienced bejesus moments.  Something happens and you jump and/or do a dance and/or scream and/or wet your pants… all this in the instant before you realize your not going to die.  Then you immediately look around to see if anyone saw you in your bejesus expulsion moment.  Then you can’t help but laugh at yourself.  I’ve actually laughed so hard at times I’ve fallen to the ground… partly because I did such a dopey thing and partly because I didn’t really die.

I can’t accurately tell you what all I did in this particular bejesus moment.  I did jump.  I did gasp.  I did drop my bleach bottle (it floated).  I did say a dirty word.  I did look to see if anyone saw me having a bejesus expulsion moment on the rocks.  I did laugh at myself.

Apparently I sprayed poor Leo with the bleach solution and that must have stung.  I would have undone the dirty deed if I could but once done…

Leo swam around the skimmer pond for a few minutes and then crawled under Alejandro F’s rock to wait for me to get away from his pond.

Not long after I left I saw Leo crawl back between some flat-stones under the waterfall. 

So as I stood at the window looking at the backyard I got to thinking about Leo and hope’n his winter sleep was going well.  That his antifreeze was working OK.  I pictured this frozen leopard frog safely tucked under the rocks waiting for the spring thaw.  It’s another one of nature’s amazing feats.  Frogs will freeze solid and then emerge unharmed when they thaw out.  Isn’t that just so cool? 

That’s what I was thinking about as I gazed out the window and saw ice on the pond.  It brought a smile to my face.

Whoohoo!!