Environment

A week of rain in Florida brings out the frogs, finally

WUSF | By Kerry Sheridan

Published June 14, 2024 at 3:30 PM EDT

All three of Sanford’s drainage basins discharge into Lake Monroe, which is in itself a basin to the St. Johns River. A basin, or watershed, is an area that collects, stores, and transports water to a certain point; Sanford Public Works Manager Mike Cash describes it as “wherever that water [in Lake Monroe] arrives <i>from</i>.” — All three of Sanford’s drainage basins discharge into Lake Monroe, which is in itself a basin to the St. Johns River. A basin, or watershed, is an area that collects, stores, and transports water to a certain point; Sanford Public Works Manager Mike Cash describes it as “wherever that water [in Lake Monroe] arrives *from*.”

Heavy rains and storms in Central and South Florida caused widespread flooding, flight cancellations, and triggered a state of emergency this week.

Despite the dangers, the heavy rains did help with drought conditions in South and Central Florida. And after a long silence, out came the frogs.

Win Everham is an ecologist who monitors frog populations.

"I'm feeling particularly in the last three to five years, that one of the manifestations of climate change locally is that we're not necessarily getting less rain. We're just getting it in bigger slugs. I've heard a lot of the meteorologists talk about, we're seeing like, these three days is what we normally get for June as a whole," he said.

"Frogs are able to survive during the dry season, they can find refugia that will allow them to adjust. So they've been there. But they aren't going to put their energy into calling until they know that the conditions are right for them to be able to reproduce. Why go to the bar and try to pick up a date when it's not going to do any good, right? So this is a signal to them, that it's a good time to make babies.

"Sometimes, one calling like, triggers the rest of them to call, because it's really males that are trying to say, 'I'm a better person to date.'

"People who aren't from here think that the seasons don't change in Florida. It's just because they're not paying attention. You know, seasons change. It's just subtle.

"One sign of this is when the rains come back and the frogs start to call. It reminds me of up north, on that first good spring day when the sun comes out, and everybody says, 'Oh, spring is here!' Right? So when I hear them in that cacophony, it's — summer's here.

There's a poem by William Stafford, and he's got a line in there where he says, ‘The frogs are singing their national anthem, again.’ And then the next line is, ‘I never knew a ditch could hold so much joy.’"
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