Frogs of the Everglades

By: Glenn Wilsey, Sr.

Frogs, like toads, are amphibians. There are many types of frogs and you can find them in any aquatic ecosystem. Some are tiny. The greenhouse frog only grows to a length of a little over one inch. Some frogs such as the bullfrog that we are all familiar with are huge, weighing as much as two pounds. There are three frogs that we see all the time here in South Florida. The pig frog, the bullfrog and the leopard frog.

The Leopard frog is the leaper of the frog family. Relatively small, growing to a length of about five inches, the leopard frog is cautious and will take off if it senses any movement close to it. Slender little frogs, the leopard frogs seem to fly through the air. They can jump as far as five feet. As a kid, I was always trying to catch leopard frogs on the banks of the canals. They like to stay close to the water because they can escape into the water if something scares them. The Leopard frogs range from a light yellow color to a light green color. They are perfectly camouflaged against the brush and grasses that grow along the banks where they live. As I tried to sneak up on a leopard frog, if it saw me or heard me (sometimes I would snap a twig) the frog would leap into the air. The frogs would always leap towards the water. Once they hit the water they would vanish like magic. When we did catch leopard frogs we would play with them, having a race or a jumping contest. We also used them as fishing bait. South Florida’s famous large-mouth bass love leopard frogs.

The bullfrog is a big bulky frog and is the frog you mainly see on television. They are used on television because of their size. A bullfrog can grow as big as two pounds and can be almost one foot long. Bullfrogs are also good jumpers and are used in frog jumping contests. They jump about one or two feet forward. That’s the difference, bullfrogs jump and leopard frogs leap.

Sometimes you may hear a bullfrog referred to as a "pig" frog, because of the low grunting noise it makes. Lots of people think they are hearing pigs out in the swamp, it is almost always a bullfrog. There is a pig frog too, and it is similar to the bullfrog. The only differences between these two frogs are the bullfrog is a little bit slimmer than the pig frog and bullfrogs are light green around their whole body while pig frogs are darker in color and they have dark freckles on their faces.

We use leopard frogs for bait when we want to catch a big bass for supper, but a bullfrog is supper. Bullfrogs are a delicacy and are great to eat. When people eat frog legs they are eating the legs of the big bullfrogs. They sell for around ten dollars a pound and that’s more than steak! If you ask someone who knows, they’ll tell you, "the best frog legs come from the everglades."

Growing up in the everglades I have spent many nights catching frogs to eat. Some people such as myself may catch bullfrogs to eat every now and then just for themselves but some people catch bullfrogs professionally, that’s how they earn their living. We call those who catch bullfrogs for a living froggers.

Froggers work at night and the work can be hard. With a light attached to their hat, froggers can see the frogs much easier in the dark than they could in daylight because the frog’s eyes reflect the light. It is somewhat dangerous, driving their airboats through the dark, spotting and then "gigging" the frogs with a four pronged gig (that is spearing them with a long fiberglass pole that has four barbed points on the end that prevent the frog from slipping off after you’ve speared it). There are some easy nights for the professional frogger but every night is different. Hot nights are not too bad because the airboat is moving and there is always a breeze. Of course, it could always rain and once you get wet, frogging isn’t much fun for either the professional or the sportsman. On a cold night a sportsman can just go home. The professional has to stay out in the cold and hope he catches enough frogs to pay for the gas for his airboat and other expenses. The professional frogger has a hard life and is not going to get rich by frogging, but can usually make enough money to pay the bills.

Frogging is an important part of our way of life here in the everglades. A night of frogging is an adventure that can be great fun. When friends get together it is even more fun. We all start out together but we go to different areas, not too far from each other. After awhile we’ll meet up at an island close by and hang out. We’ll talk about the frogs we have caught and the things we have seen. While frogging, you can spot many animals that live in the everglades. Often, we’ll see deer while frogging. They see the light and they freeze, looking right at us. This is "the deer in the headlights look" just like people see while driving cars at night and seeing a deer on the road. The deer stop and stare at the car lights. In many cases, when that happens, there is a car wreck. Cars have nowhere to go and end up hitting the deer or running off the road. On an airboat we just turn and go in any direction we want. It’s all open grass and some of the grass is so thick that we may get stuck in it, but that is all a part of having fun sometimes.

Many times, I’ll spot a gleaming eye in the grass and turn my airboat around thinking it’s a big frog and at the last second I’ll see it’s an alligator in the high grass and pull up my gig, missing the alligator. There’s always a surprise when I go out frogging. The animals of the everglades are more active at night so you have a better chance of seeing them and you never know what you’ll see. I have even seen a panther walking on the levee at L-28 in the cypress forest. I spotted a black bear on the same levee another night. We see lots of animals on the levee because the levee is like a long man made island for the animals. It’s high ground. Sometimes someone will claim they saw "bigfoot" or, as those critters are called around these parts, a "skunk-ape" and everyone will laugh. But...you never know.

Like the Bufo toads I told you about in my last story, the bullfrog has a large appetite and will eat anything it can catch and fit in its mouth. While cleaning frogs, I have found many different things in their stomachs. I have found fish, tadpoles, eels, and salamanders in the stomachs of bullfrogs. One night I cut open a bullfrog and found a live baby water snake in the stomach. My best friend, the late Mr. Johnny Strong, was cleaning his frogs one night and found a newborn baby alligator in a bullfrog’s stomach.

I also heard a story where a man was cleaning his frogs one night and was bitten by a baby Cottonmouth moccasin that was in the stomach of a frog. I don’t know if that one is true or not though. There is a grasshopper called the Lubber and the only thing in the everglades that will eat it (that I know of) is a bullfrog. I have never cleaned a toad, since we don’t eat toads, so I couldn’t tell for sure if a toad would eat a Lubber grasshopper. The Lubbers eat plants that are toxic then they excrete the toxin and that makes them taste terrible. Even the kings of the everglades, the alligators, will only grab a Lubber grasshopper one time in their lives (when they are very young and still learning what is good to eat) and they’ll never try one again.

In my story about Toads, I said I would tell you what would happen if you kissed a frog. Well folks, if you kiss a Frog everyone around you is going to laugh. You have to admit, kissing a frog would be pretty funny.

I do hope everyone liked my story this month and I will try to write another story for you soon.

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