For years I've given advice on what to do with frog and toad
population explosions in the pond.
One of those bits of advice is to feed them lightly boiled
organic lettuce.

So I figured I ought to try this advice myself.

One batch of the Pacific Treefrog eggs I adopted from
jan went into one of my pondlets on the kitchen windowsill.
I decided I would add some lightly boiled organic lettuce
to their habitat.

I went to the store to purchase the lettuce. I noted that organic
romaine costs twice as much as 'regular' romaine. It was packaged
in plastic with those little holes. The edges were brown, there was
mold, the cut edge was really brown and the outer leaves were
wilted. To top it all off there was a dead fly in the package!
That herbicide and pesticide romaine was looking better all the time!

Once home I lightly boiled some leaves.
Warning, boiling organic romaine smells yukky and
teenagers will view it in extreme alarm if you boil it close to the
dinner hour. It is not true that teenage boys will eat anything, like
bullfrogs, that they can cram in their mouths. Boiled organic romaine
lettuce leaves proves that.

I think you can get the same effect from letting the leaves hang
out in a dish of expensive bottled water. (Gotta watch out for
chlorine and other nastiness ~ though I've heard a lot of bottled
water comes from effervescent county and city water supplies,
gushing from pipes deep within the water treatment plant, but
that's another story...)

Once the leaves were cooled I put a piece of one into the pondlet.
The tadpoles ignored it. Ungrateful little critters, this stuff is like
gold!

I've only used up one small piece of lettuce. I have tons left.
So the experiment will continue. I just have to get rid of the moldy
parts, put the dead fly in the pondlet for some protein and find a
corner of the fridge for the stuff to continue rotting in.

k30a