I do not like the very warm and humid weather we have this labor day weekend but this frog didn’t seem to mind it. I found this little guy on the bottom of a canyon in the White Pine Hollow State Preserve, near Luxembourg, Iowa. I’m not one hundred percent sure if this is a young Pickerel Frog because I only have this image from its side. In Iowa the Pickerel Frog is only found in the very eastern part along the Mississippi. There is a chance that this is its cousin, the more common Northern Leopard Frog, but it looks like this frog has a paired series of squarish blotches extending down the back between the dorsolateral folds. No other frog in Iowa has paired squarish blotches. (source: The Salamanders and Frogs of Iowa, by J.L. Christansen and R.M. Bailey, Nov. 1991). I guess next time I pay a little more attention to the details while I see the critter … 😉
The second photo shows the habitat, a slow running stream that runs between the rock walls of the canyon, and pools filled with crystal clear water. The reason I went to White Pine Hollow was because I wanted to try out a new photo technique that actually required fast running water. There wasn’t enough water coming down the creek this time and so this project had to be put on hold, but coming back with these photos was a nice reward for hiking into the canyon despite heat and humidity.