Frog houses are a great idea. They snuggle into a cool corner of your garden and give your frogs somewhere to hide from the cats and cool off when they are not in the water. Frogs are important in the garden as they gobble up that nasty mosquito larvae. So if you have water you need frogs. How to make a frog house!? Drive around on the ride-on mower with the flames painted on the side, and yawn at the same time as you take a tight corner, then smash into a terra cotta pot housing your most precious Polyanthus Tuberosa Tubers that look like bulbs. That is Step number One.
Because the best Frog Houses are made of junk and broken pots. I repotted the Polyanthus Tuberosa ( I like to say Polyanthus Tuberosa because is sounds so intelligent when you say it out loud and it is the kind of word that rolls about your mouth!), using some of the smaller pieces of terracotta in the bottom of the new pot for drainage. Then I took the big curved broken pieces and added another broken pot that had been waiting for just such an occassion, and made a dark damp hide away for frogs. I tucked it in beside the wine cask that sits under a down pipe, where a frog lives every year. The cats hate my frog houses. 
When we were kids at the beach in NZ, we used to fill the inside of an old tire with water and almost always a frog would take up residence. Then you make the frog house inside the tire. Not as pretty but still fun for children.
Now look who we have here. This little chick has two mothers. I am not sure how this happened but yesterday I saw both chooks fly at and run off a bemused pea hen, then zoom clucking with indignation, back to this one little chick. I guess it is some kind of shared parenting. I would like to think it is the chicken TonTon retrieved but I don’t think it is. I think that one fell through the cracks in time. This might be his sister though. 
And here is our wee Stinky the Second. The chick recovering from a hawk attack. She has these two massive wounds on either side of her body but they have dried up and no longer smell. Yesterday I let her back in with her sisters. And they accepted her without fuss. Her ability to get about is improving too. There are plans afoot to make a mobile run for them. So they are hanging out in a makeshift run on the lawn. 
I call her Stinky the Second because the first Stinky was the first chick that I nursed back to health after a rat gnawed at her head. This was before I got cats and guineas for the barn and a rooster for the hen house. They keep the rodent population in check. Stinky lived for years but had a tendency to walk in circles. 
Now you are never going to guess what these seedlings are. Wait, I will find you the link. OK. Remember when we collected the hedge apples in the fall and stored them in a bucket outside all winter. Well, earlier in the spring we took the pongy mess down the back and poured it along some shallow trenches. I did not blog that step because frankly it looked like grey vomit and I could not see how any seed could be viable in that mess. However much to my surprise the seeds are sprouting. We are growing a hedge! A very old fashioned hedge! Oh me of little faith!!
Good morning. We had some rain in the night which was very welcome after such a hot day yesterday. It looks like today will be much cooler but sunny. The plants will have a wonderful stress free growing day today.
There are many new readers to the Kitchens Garden pages and WELCOME to you all! I am going to do a walkabout with the camera today and post the shots tomorrow for you. I will put together a page with introductions and updates for all the animal characters whose stories we follow. So you will all know who is who.
One thing to remember when you are reading is that I post around dawn every morning and the material is always from the previous day. So everything is absolutely current and from The Kitchens Garden and it’s Farm, unless we have a field trip. I will tell you if I use a shot that is more than 24 hours old, but I very seldom do.
Remind me to call the swine herd again today. I need to find out when we can pick up Sheila The Baby Piglet. I will certainly take you in my camera on that field trip.
Well Minty is calling from her gate. She is being weaned down to two bottles a day and is not taking it well. I hate the weaning.
Have a lovely day.
celi
The Kitchen's Garden 
75 responses to “How To Make a Frog House”
Morning Celia, lovely to see your frog house, our resident toads take up similar habitats in the summer, lovely to have them around. Right, I’m off with the camera and correct lens, the sun is trying oh so hard to come out from behind a sea mist. Hi ho !
Oh the sea mist!! I love the smell of it! Morning Claire.. c
A frog house–what a great idea!
Good morning to you and all your farm creatures! c
Excellent frog house and great news about the hedge apples 😉
Morning Mad, the hedge apples are a bit of a surprise.. c
Good morning Celia, great to see your splendid frog houses.
We have our dam located quite close to the house, great to watch all the wildlife close up. However the noise in summer can be a wee bit overwhelming for the visitor who’s not used to hearing the frog cacophony.
it is rather a cacophony isn’t it.. I bet you love it as much as i do though! c
Morning, C! I do love being able to start the day with you on the Farmy…
Good to see Stinky the Second recovering from her trauma. The young ones are so resilient…
I’m sure “stinky” didn’t begin to describe the state of that Hedge Apple mess when you poured it out – ugh!
Have a lovely, cooler day. We have fog and rain. Again.
It was remarkably foul! Oh dear Fog and Rain, you need some sun over there! c
from your lips, to God’s ears, as they say… 😉
Right, I am off to go and find my ride on mower…while I do that, C, please remember to phone swine herd again.
🙂 Mandy
Yes.. i must call him, and find out what is going on! Morning Mandy.. c
Oh, good, a tour of the Farmy AND possibly a field trip soon. Do we need signed permission slips for the field trip? 🙂
Good point! I must remember to pass out the permission slips! hilarious! c
Good Morning…I am halfway through reading everyone of your posts from the begining. So much has been learned, stories have been enjoyed, and recipies tried.
Smiles abound here at my little place.
That is fantastic.. let me know which are your favourites! Smiles are GOOD!!! c
I am looking forward to the report of another conversation with the Herford Haaahg farmer, and even more to the day you collect Sheila in your short skirt and stilleto heels 🙂 So glad Stinky2 is recovering so well, and I’m off to build a frog house with a pot a boisterous weimaraner knocked off a table …. should do the job? Laura
Sounds perfect, I am sure the dog did a frog a favour! Morning Laura!
Well, if shared parenting is good enough for our muscovies, then I don’t see why hens can’t try it! That’s going to be one spoiled Chick with two doting mothers!
Christine
I thought about your ducks when i saw this. They both cuddle down to sit on the chick and often I will see it pop its head up between them. most unusual.. c
Lovely post – I had to go back and read about the start of the hedge apple saga, and enjoyed it very much. I think I have an accidental frog house behind the hedge: the pile of bits of pot waiting to be used as planter drainage! Because we have fierce Dick Tur-a-pin in the pond, I haven’t found any frogs there yet.
morning ViV, what is a Dick Tur-a-pin? c
A Florida Red-Eared Slider terrapin – a rescue terrapin given to us by a veterinary neighbours. He is carnivorous. The name is Jock’s idea of a joke (highwayman Dick Turpin may not have percolated South or West – he came to a bad end). When he first came, he was called Lulu.
ah, well i can see why LuLu is an incongruous label for this fella.. I think I remember being in a pub in London that bragged about having Dick Turpin as a regular in the old old days? c
G’mornin’, Celi! Well, I learn something new here virtually every day. Now I know how to build a frog house, should I ever need one. Poor little chickster! Good to see she’s coming along.
“Stinky lived for years but had a tendency to walk in circles.” I know the feeling.
Morning John, you will be enjoying a cool morning too.. ! c
Afternoon – sorry, am catching up! Glad Stinky is doing well, we had a Stinky too (didn´t have such a great name though) and she settled back in the with girls when she was better.
I have found that wounded chickens smell very bad.. hence the name Stinky. When that smell goes away then they are healing.. Thankfully this wee girl is healing, morning tanya! c
No matter what goes on around the farmy we can count on you to show us the positive side. Thanks for being so sunny.
There is nothing better than toads in your garden!