will cleaning up around pond lose frog habitat

[ugabulldog]

I have about 1/2 acre pond that banks have been let grow wild for a few years. lots of frogs. If I clean up the underbrush etc. except for a few younger trees and leave grass growing in water edge, will I lose the frogs? I don't want to but know it would look better cleaned up some. Thanks

[Fire-Man]

Originally Posted by ugabulldog

I have about 1/2 acre pond that banks have been let grow wild for a few years. lots of frogs. If I clean up the underbrush etc. except for a few younger trees and leave grass growing in water edge, will I lose the frogs? I don't want to but know it would look better cleaned up some. Thanks

My pond is clean-----cut with a lawn Mower on 3 sides and I got plenty of frogs-----to many I feel sometimes. My home is about 10ft from the edge of the pond at the closest place.

[fishhead]

Frogs need some place to hide from the herons and other predators. Maybe set some aside for them and clean the rest.

My commercial ponds were keep fairly mowed except on the slopes and within a few weeks of the frogs emerging the herons had dropped the frog population way down.

[Ernie]

Herons will do that. I chase them off. Those are my frogs and I enjoy eating them too much to let a big ol' stinky bird eat them.

Anyway, frogs live in the water and by the water. I would suppose that anywhere you can get a mower isn't really much of a frog habitat and probably won't hurt cutting. So long as there's grass, lily pads, or some other vegetation and structure right by the shore.

[wannabechef]

Originally Posted by ugabulldog

I have about 1/2 acre pond that banks have been let grow wild for a few years. lots of frogs. If I clean up the underbrush etc. except for a few younger trees and leave grass growing in water edge, will I lose the frogs? I don't want to but know it would look better cleaned up some. Thanks

You'll be fine. I trim around the pond below my house with a trimmer and mower and they are still jumping in the water in those areas when I go fishing.

[Just Little Me]

Cleaning around the pond will help protect them from snakes and other predators.

[littlejoe]

I play dumb and don't answer many questions on HT, cuz there are so many internet experts on so many subjects....

Yes, frogs need habitat conducive to reproduction. That means cover for them and their reproductive cycles. That habitat will also bring in predator species. There will sometimes be imbalances from top to bottom, or bottom to top.

Maybe you can limit the predator species to favor your micro-system? But I doubt it! Nature seems to control what we try to, and she has proven this time and again. She's a brutally cool witch, which we have no control over, even if we think we have a small grasp on.

[Nimrod]

Frogs eat bugs. If you cut down all the cover will it also reduce the bug population? Would this reduce the frog population?

[fishhead]

Some frogs spend a majority of their time in thick grass away from water. That seems to be where I see the largest leopard frogs.