Treefrog Callings

     During spring in the Middle Atlantic States, males of three kinds of treefrogs in the Hylidae family, spring peepers, gray treefrogs and chorus frogs, broadcast simple, beautiful courting songs that bring the genders of each species together for spawning in the shallow water of impoundments and wetlands. 
     The courtship calling of all frogs and toads is simple, repetitive and ancient, a remnant of the eons ago Amphibian Age.  Their peeps, trills, grunts and moans are delightful to hear because they symbolize spring's arrival, the long ago past, and just thrilling to experience as another part of nature.  The throat of each courting male bulges with every vocalization, amplifying its volume so females of each kind can hear them and come to the males in or near shallow water to spawn.
     We hear the three species of tree frogs mentioned above far more often than we see them because of their small sizes and blending into their habitats.  And we note their presence and identify them more by sound than sight.  I've been happy to hear the vernal choruses of each of these species of little frogs many times through the years here in the Middle Atlantic States.
     Spring peepers are the most common and widespread of these treefrogs in the Mid-Atlantic States.  Most anyone who goes to appropriate habitats in the eastern United States and Canada in April to hear male peepers will probably have opportunities to do so.  Light brown with a darker X across their backs and only an inch long, peepers' loud peeping far out-strips their diminutive size.  Many males calling together, while perched on cattails and other plants emerging from the shallows,  make an almost deafening sound.  But from a distance, they sound like sleigh bells.  They peep mostly at night, but also on rainy days.        
     During the warm evenings of May and June, male gray treefrogs emit short, musical trills from trees along the edges of the shallow water they will spawn in.  About an inch and a half long, they are light gray or dull green with darker markings, and, to me, look like little toads.  They live in the eastern half of the United States where there are abundant trees growing in ample wetlands.
     But chorus frogs are my favorite treefrogs because I like hearing their soothing, gentle trilling that sounds like a thumb nail running up the teeth of a comb, " cccrrreeeeeeeekkk", with an upward pitch.  That melancholy sound is heard across the mid-west of Canada and the United States east to southeastern Pennsylvania and the Atlantic Coast from New Jersey and the Delmarva Peninsula  into The South.  
     Only an inch long and gray with darker markings for camouflage, chorus frogs' greatest beauty is in their mellow trills that I have always enjoyed hearing in the Middle Atlantic States during March and into April.  To me, the love songs of male chorus frogs characterize most the shallows of wetlands in thickets of tall grass, cattails, bushes and small trees at dusk in early spring.  Their calm, ageless calling touches my soul.  All is well with the world!
     Though seldom seen, the beautiful, perhaps mystifying, songs of these common and widespread treefrogs make time spent outdoors in spring more enjoyable.  And they are a reminder of the distant past, the long ago Age of Amphibians.