On Fri, 27 Jul 2012 17:07:15 +0100, Jake wrote:

When I cut the lawns, I usually heave out the lawn mower and get
going. But having found a tiny froglet yesterday, I checked carefully
before starting to mow. Before long I had collected, and returned to
the pond, about 20 little froglets of varying sizes. Had I just
started cutting, I would have had 20 little chopped up froglets.

Later, I found some on one of the front lawns and I only noticed those
because they were surrounded by a group of baby slow worms (about 3"
long) and presumably about to be eaten! If those froglets came from my
pond (and I know of no other in the vicinity), they had migrated about
30 metres!

I've never known them to leave the pond like this, let alone in such
numbers. Why they have done so is a mystery.

In my experience, froglets 'migrate' out of the pond once metamophosed. One July after a
heavy shower, our lawn was like a Biblical plague. There were scores of tiny frogs all
heading East. Another year we had your problem and luckily we had friends round who were
daft enough to ruffle the grass in front of us and move evry froglet to safety. It made
mowing fun for once!