Amphibians and Arachnids

We have budding herpetologists at our house these days. Yesterday as I was clearing out the dead parts around an iris plant, I noticed a little green frog perched nicely on one of the stems. The girls gathered around and we watched the frog for several minutes before returning to our game.

Today as we went back outside for our recreation time, our green froggy friend was sitting on the deck steps. This time GVG saw a little more action than perhaps she wanted. She screamed as the frog used her hand as a "stepping stone" when moving from the step to the railing. To get a closer look, GVG ran in to get a magnifying glass, and we all took turns examining the frog's texture, the legs, the feet, the eyes, the ear membranes, etc. The features of our green frog matched the features of the green tree frog in our book. So we believe we found a green tree frog.

Then, just a few feet over MEG found a spider. Again, the magnifying glass went from hand to hand as we examined it closely. Our spider book revealed we had discovered an orange garden spider, complete with it's web.

The door was opened up wide for an impromptu science lesson today. During our reading time, we read more about both creatures we had found. Tonight at the dinner table MEG asked Daddy, "Do you know what cold blooded is?" Then she proceeded to tell him the difference between cold and warm blooded animals.

MEG was our one this summer that found a few toads in the garden and wanted to keep them as pets. We looked into building a proper habitat for the toads to stay in the garden, but that never found it's way onto our priority list. Maybe that can be a project for MEG next summer.

In case you were wondering, we still were able to get in plenty of rec time even though the science lesson consumed a big chunk of it.

Enjoying God's creation....well, maybe not the spiders, but the frogs are okay.
~Wee