Spring Concert

Nature puts on a concert every spring, and you don’t need tickets to attend. Just head outside at sunset and explore marshes, ponds, wet fields, and flooded ditches. As the sun sinks, the show kicks into full swing when each puddle and pool overflows with a chorus of singing frogs and toads.

The tiny frogs with huge voices aren’t singing for you. They’re lovesick males who are belting out ballads in hopes of charming a girlfriend.

In a crowded pond, several kinds of frogs and toads may sing at the same time. Each species makes a unique call. This helps males and females of the same species find each other. (Sometimes we can’t hear the difference, but they can.) Once a female has zeroed in on a few crooning croakers of her own kind, she listens closely to each potential boyfriend’s song. The male who calls loudest and most often usually wins her affection.

Love Songs

Male frogs and toads sing without moving their lips. How? Before singing, a male shuts his mouth and seals the holes in his nose. Then he pushes air out of his lungs. The air flows over his vocal cords, making his unique call. The air also inflates a stretchy pouch on his throat. The pouch, like the hollow body of a guitar or the bell of a horn, makes the call louder. Some kinds of frogs — like spring peepers — have a single pouch that inflates like a big balloon. Others — like northern crawfish frogs — have paired pouches that swell up like a trumpet player’s cheeks.

The Circle of Life

Mama frogs and toads lay their jellylike eggs in woodland puddles, flooded fields, marshes, and fish-free ponds. Some species can lay over 20,000 eggs at a time!

In a few days or a few weeks — depending on what kind of frog or toad it is — the eggs hatch, and squiggly tadpoles begin swimming around. Tadpoles have a long, fishlike tail and breathe water.

Some tadpoles live in the water for just a few weeks. Others live there for over a year. Most tadpoles eat tiny aquatic plants.

Eventually, tadpoles lose their tails and sprout arms and legs. They can now hop onto land, breathe air, and look for mates.

Spring Peeper

These tiny frogs — they’re only an inch long — come in a variety of colors, from pink to tan to gray. One trait they all share is an X-shaped mark on their backs. On light-colored peepers, the X can be hard to see.

Venue: Spring peepers live in woods and forests near ponds, marshes, and swamps. They’re found throughout Missouri except for the far northwest corner.

Showtime: Spring peepers are one of the first frogs to sing in spring. They begin calling in late February and continue until mid-May.

Set List: A chorus of spring peepers sounds like jingle bells ringing. Listen for a cheerful, high-pitched peeeeeep repeated once each second.

Boreal Chorus Frog

Chorus frogs can be told from other itty-bitty amphibians by a pair of dark stripes that run from the snout, across each eye, and down each side of the body.

Venue: Boreal chorus frogs are common on prairies, wet pastures, marshes, river edges, and backyard puddles. They’re common throughout Missouri, except in the southeastern corner where they’re replaced by look-alike Cajun chorus frogs and upland chorus frogs.

Showtime: Chorus frogs begin calling nearly as early as spring peepers. The concert starts in late February, peaks in April, and winds down by July.

Set List: Singing chorus frogs make a noise similar to the sound of running your fingernail over the teeth of a comb: crrreeeeeeep!

Wood Frog

These 2-inch-long frogs are perfectly colored to blend in with fallen dead leaves. Like several other frogs, a wood frog’s body can freeze nearly solid in winter and thaw out — just in time to sing — in spring.

Venue: Wood frogs are uncommon in Missouri. They live in cool, shady, rocky forests along the eastern edge of the state.

Showtime: Wood frogs put on a short show. Listen for them in fish-free, woodland ponds from early February through March.

Set List: Wood frogs sound like quacking ducks. Listen for a hoarse, quack-like waaaduck!

Pickerel Frog

This handsome frog has two large folds of skin running down either side of its back. In between the folds are two parallel rows of squarish dark spots. Although pickerel frogs usually call from the water’s surface (like other frogs and toads), they sometimes call while underwater.

Venue: Look for pickerel frogs in springs, cold Ozark streams, and shady woodland ponds. They’re common in southern and eastern Missouri and absent in the northwestern third of the state.

Showtime: Pickerel frogs begin calling in early March and continue until late May.

Set List: Some people think a pickerel frog’s call sounds like someone passing gas. Let’s be more kind and describe it as a low-pitched snore that lasts for a couple seconds.

Northern Crawfish Frog

You’re more likely to hear this secretive frog than see it. Crawfish frogs spend most of their lives hiding in burrows, usually those made by crayfish.

Venue: Crawfish frogs live only on healthy prairies. Since prairie habitats have disappeared across most of Missouri, these frogs are in danger of disappearing, too.

Showtime: To hear these rare but wonderful singers, visit a prairie at dusk from March through mid-May. Males are more likely to sing after a warm, heavy rain has created pools for them to gather in.

Set List: Getting a girlfriend must make crawfish frogs sleepy. A male’s call sounds like a loud, deep snore: gwwaaaaa. A bunch of males calling together sounds like pigs grunting at a trough.

American Toad

Contrary to popular belief, you can’t get warts from touching a toad. The bumps — they’re not warts — on a toad’s skin give it a rocklike appearance, helping the chubby amphibians hide in rocky habitats. The bumps also release a mild poison. It isn’t strong enough to hurt people, but it can make animals like dogs or cats sick.

Venue: American toads prefer rocky, wooded areas, but they can be found nearly anywhere, including backyards and gardens. They hide during the day under rocks, logs, and in shallow burrows.

Showtime: American toads begin calling on warm nights in mid-March. Singing season peaks in May and winds down in July.

Set List: An American toad’s call is a high-pitched, musical trill that sounds a bit like steam whistling out of a tea kettle: breeeeeeeee! The call can last up to 30 seconds.

Fowler’s Toad

How do chubby toads catch zippy bugs? With a spring-loaded tongue, of course. Toads can flick out their tongues faster than you can blink. Plus, a toad’s sticky tongue can stretch nearly 2 inches out of its mouth, which often leaves bugs tongue-tied.

Venue: Fowler’s toads are common on sand and gravel bars along Ozark streams. They’re also found in fields, backyards, and gardens except in the northwestern corner of the state.

Showtime: In southern Missouri, Fowler’s toads begin calling in late March. In northern Missouri, they start calling in May.

Set List: A Fowler’s toad sounds a bit like it’s crying when it sings. Listen for a nasal waaaaaaaaah that lasts about three seconds.

Southern Leopard Frog

Leopard frogs have dark spots on their backs like their feline namesake. These 5-inch-long amphibians can jump farther than you think. When startled, they leap into the water and disappear with a splash.

Venue: During mating season, this frog hangs out near ponds, sloughs, and flooded ditches. At other times, it may venture far from water and be found in pastures, meadows, and woods. They’re common throughout Missouri except in the far northwest corner.

Showtime: Leopard frogs begin singing in early March. The boys in the band really begin belting it out in April, but their calling calms down by July.

Set List: Imagine if you tickled a duck, and it let loose a series of abrupt, chuckling quacks. That’s what a southern leopard frog’s call sounds like.

Gray Treefrog

Now you see me. Now you don’t. Gray treefrogs have a handy trick to hide from hungry hunters. The 2-inch-long frogs can change color — turning from gravel-gray to bark-brown to leafy-green — to match whatever they’re crawling on.

Venue: Gray treefrogs live in trees in forests and along streams. They also hang out near houses. Look for them on decks and clinging to windows at night, gobbling up bugs that are attracted to porch lights.

Showtime: When evening temperatures reach 60 degrees — usually in May — gray treefrogs start singing. Their concerts start at sundown and continue through the night.

Set List: Listen for a musical, birdlike trill. A gray treefrog’s call sounds a bit like an American toad’s but has a slightly lower pitch and a slightly slower tempo.

Green Treefrog

Like their grayer-colored cousins, green treefrogs have suction cups on the tips of their toes that help them cling to leaves, branches, and even glass. A thin layer of mucus makes their long toes extra sticky.

Venue: These bright-green, 2-inch-long amphibians hide in vegetation that surrounds marshes, swamps, and rivers in the southeast corner of Missouri.

Showtime: Green treefrogs begin singing after dark from mid-April through early August.

Set List: A chorus of green treefrogs sounds like a distant flock of Canada geese or a dog chewing on a squeaky toy. Listen for a series of nasal gwank, gwank, gwanks.

American Bullfrog

Missouri’s largest frog can reach 8 inches long — from the tip of its snout to the back of its behind — and it has an appetite to match. A hungry bullfrog will eat nearly any critter it can cram inside its cavernous mouth, including insects, crayfish, fish, small snakes, birds, rodents, and even other frogs.

Venue: This common frog is found in marshes, ponds, and streams throughout Missouri.

Showtime: Bullfrogs call on warm nights, usually between midnight and sunrise. The nightly concert starts in April, grows loudest in June, and winds down in August.

Set List: When they’re looking for a girlfriend, adult males make calls that sound like deep, rumbling burps. The love burps can be heard over half a mile away.

Green Frog

These common frogs look a lot like their larger cousins, American bullfrogs. One way to tell them apart is that a green frog has a fold of skin along both sides of its back.

Venue: Green frogs live in streams (especially in the Ozarks), marshes, swamps, and ponds. They’re found throughout Missouri except for the western quarter of the state.

Showtime: Green frogs may start calling in late March in southern Missouri. But the real concert kicks off in mid-April, peaks in June, and winds down in July.

Set List: Brong! A male green frog’s call sounds like a loose banjo string plucked extra hard.

Blanchard’s Cricket Frog

Cricket frogs belong to the treefrog family, but you aren’t likely to find one high in the branches. They don’t have sticky toe pads like their tree-climbing cousins. The inch-long amphibians can be told from other itty-bitty frogs by the dark triangle between their eyes.

Venue: Look for cricket frogs along the edges of streams, ponds, and marshes.

Showtime: Although mating peaks in June, cricket frogs may start calling in mid-March in southern Missouri. Singing males can be heard day and night throughout the summer.

Set List: Sometimes, a love song just clicks. To attract a girlfriend, male cricket frogs make a tapping glick-glick-glick call that sounds like two pebbles being clicked rapidly together.

To hear live recordings of amphibian love songs, search for frogs and toads at mdc.mo.gov/field-guide.